Week 10

        My co-teaching partner and I finished our Social Studies Unit this week.  There were a couple of issues within the three lessons but overall, I think it was pretty successful.  We had to separate them into groups for the first lesson so they could go to different centers throughout the room.  The centers were about Native American shelters, clothing, and food.  Some of the problems that occurred was a lack of attention and getting distracted by their friends.  We also had to group them for the second lesson.  They did an archeological dig and had to mark off which things were used by Native Americans and which things are used by us.  There were also some behavior issues with this lesson but overall they did well.  For the third lesson, they did not have to be put in groups.  They all made their own Native American names and then they all made their own pottery bowls out of play-doh.  Surprisingly, there were not any serious behavior problems during the third lesson.
        Looking back on these lessons, I think the main reason for this class' misbehavior is the style of grouping.  The personalities of the students do not seem to work that well together and it definitely shows when they are working in cooperative groups.  I also think misbehavior occurs because these students have not yet learned how to work in groups so they do not know how to act with their peers in this setting.
        This kind of upsets me because I think children should learn at a young age how to interact with their peers in an academic setting.  It is very clear that the classroom I am in right now, rarely uses cooperative groups during the day.  It is mostly individual work while sitting at their desks.  I hope this can change over time and I know I will be using a good amount of cooperative groups in my future classroom.