How do secondary school teachers choose within-class student grouping strategies?

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Pupil grouping and organisation of classes

How did teachers choose between individual or small group work?

Teachers identified a variety of learning purposes served by different types of grouping. Individual working was used to give students opportunities to consolidate their learning by doing. This also gave teachers the chance to assess their students’ understanding. The mathematics teachers in the study used small groups only infrequently, but found such groups useful for investigative work.

“When you have a problem, you have to look at it from different angles… getting other people’s opinions and what other people think makes them a bit more aware…” Mathematics teacher

English and science teachers used small groups more frequently than mathematics teachers, but all teachers identified a variety of learning purposes for small group work, including:

stimulating, pooling and developing ideas;
planning, carrying out, analysing and evaluating practical work;
verbalising thinking to clarify and improve understanding; and
engaging students actively in their learning.

One teacher explained the importance of active student engagement:

“It’s for them to find these things out for themselves. They are in school to learn and me telling them isn’t learning.” Science teacher

Group work helped students to engage actively with the task, but did not guarantee that they would do so. A number of teachers expressed reservations about the value of group work for some students who sat back and allowed others to do the work. The researchers commented that this could also happen in whole class teaching.

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Research Home Themes \| Find digests \| About the digests resources glossary researchers contact TRIPS Introduction How did grouping strategies vary during lessons? Why did teachers use whole class groups at lesson starts and ends? How did teachers choose between individual or small group work? What was the effect of whole class grouping on lesson content? How did behaviour management affect teachers’ grouping practices? How did practical factors influence teachers’ choice of grouping strategy? How did the researchers collect their data? Implications Send us your feedback Collated digests To find out more about collated digests click here Get Word Reader How do secondary school teachers choose within-class student grouping strategies? This digest found in Pupil grouping and organisation of classes Send to a friend Word doc 80KB Printer friendly Collate for later How did teachers choose between individual or small group work? Teachers identified a variety of learning purposes served by different types of grouping. Individual working was used to give students opportunities to consolidate their learning by doing. This also gave teachers the chance to assess their students’ understanding. The mathematics teachers in the study used small groups only infrequently, but found such groups useful for investigative work. “When you have a problem, you have to look at it from different angles… getting other people’s opinions and what other people think makes them a bit more aware…” Mathematics teacher English and science teachers used small groups more frequently than mathematics teachers, but all teachers identified a variety of learning purposes for small group work, including: stimulating, pooling and developing ideas; planning, carrying out, analysing and evaluating practical work; verbalising thinking to clarify and improve understanding; and engaging students actively in their learning. One teacher explained the importance of active student engagement: “It’s for them to find these things out for themselves. They are in school to learn and me telling them isn’t learning.” Science teacher Group work helped students to engage actively with the task, but did not guarantee that they would do so. A number of teachers expressed reservations about the value of group work for some students who sat back and allowed others to do the work. The researchers commented that this could also happen in whole class teaching.