2.+Co-Teaching+with+Centers

o **How to- give specific steps for strategy implementation:** //This is less of a strategy and more of a style of teaching. Many teachers do not have the opportunity provided to them to have another teacher aiding with student learning within the classroom. For many faculty members, a co-teacher is only brought in to help with inclusion classes. For some, a co-teacher is always in the classroom aiding with a larger class size and ensuring student learning. When co-teaching, divide students into small groups. This will allow for more direct instruction with students. Each teacher can teach the same subject or concept but deliver it to the children according to learning styles. Many teachers use “centers” or “stations” and the coworkers rotate around to each group teaching different elements of a subject. While instructors are not with certain groups, the groups are working on individual assignments in order to reach an overall goal. Centers can also be used as a review strategy. Each center will be comprised of a different skill set learned within a unit. Anywhere from 5-8 centers are recommended for use depending on class size. Each center may appeal to different modalities of learning ensuring maximum retention for all students.// o **When to-implement in content area (provide specific justification)** § **Language Arts:** When learning parts of speech, many students have difficulty identifying parts of a sentence as well as the parts of speech. Language Arts teachers have addressed this issue by requiring students to “diagram” sentences. By using centers, students can use music by creating a song to identify and memorize parts of a sentence. Naturalistic modalities can use parts of the environment to create a sentence structure. § **Social Studies:** Students will create roles for themselves and plan an exploration. The pioneers, Magellan, Cortez, or any explorer discussed in a unit will be perfect to implement centers. At each center students will plan a route they want to take to reach a certain destination, pick their role on the journey (cook, doctor, etc.), plan what supplies they should bring, and what they expect to find when they reach their destination plus how their home country or town will feel about their new discovery. § **Mathematics:** In multi-step equations and geometrical proofs, students are required to think logically through a problem. In math, the centers can serve as a scavenger hunt type activity. In order to reach the correct answer, students must master all the previous steps in an equation to be led to the correct ending of the hunt. Each teacher can position themselves at a central location and the end of the hunt adding to the experience by dressing up or awarding prizes for the teams that complete the project the fastest or every team to reward their achievements. § **Science:** The scientific method, a skill utilized in every science course, can be reinforced using centers. Have students design their own experiment. Each station will represent a different stage in the scientific method and experiment process. Students will research their topic, develop a hypothesis with their group of what they believe will happen based on prior research, design an experiment, complete the experiment, report their findings and evaluate their hypothesis. o **Research and references that supports the “effective instruction” label for this strategy** To implement effective co-teaching strategies, the two instructors must share a common vision. The common vision is especially important when working with an inclusion classroom. Co-teaching has many benefits, including individualized instruction, easier classroom management, and differentiation. By using centers within a co-teaching environment, students are more likely to get the help they need with one on one instruction and the ability to appeal to the different learning styles and modalities (Brown & Martin, 2011). § **Benefits** § **Drawbacks** o **Learning styles, modalities, intelligences, or abilities addressed** Centers allow for all learning styles, modalities, and intelligences to be addressed. Each center can be tweaked to ensure that gifted students, at standard, and even lower level students are having their needs addressed. o A summative assessment is necessary when using centers. Students should create a final product to turn in for evaluation. A rubric should be used in many situations, especially within the areas of science, social studies, and language arts.
 * **Name of Strategy:** // Co-Teaching with Centers (Professional Development) //
 * Students receive individualized instruction aiding to a higher understanding of materials. Misconceptions can be addressed promptly resulting in correct application of learned skills.
 * Classroom management is increased by having a second set of eyes to ensure student engagement.
 * All students are engaged in the content by participation of every group member in order to complete a project.
 * Class time that could otherwise be used for content instruction will be taken up by instructors having to explain directions for properly executing centers. This can be remedied by explaining them once and instructing students that if they can follow these directions, they will be able to use this strategy again.
 * **Ways to assess the teaching/learning connection**
 * **Classroom management considerations**
 * By having a second teacher in the classroom, classroom management should be even more effective. The second set of eyes should keep all students engaged.
 * Classroom space could become an issue with limited seating room and floor space to arrange centers in. This situation is a perfect example of how having a co-teacher would benefit immensely. The co-teacher can take students to the computer lab, or an empty classroom or laboratory set up in order to maximize space.

Brown, L., & Martin, D., (Directors) (2011, August 18). Co-Teaching and Effective Instruction. //Professional Development at LCMS //. Lecture conducted from LCMS, Dahlonega.

This seminar was held to help the teachers at Lumpkin County adapt to the setting of having a co-taught classroom. Many teachers have co-taught before, so the faculty was somewhat disengaged. Most of the co-teaching situations at Lumpkin County, if not all, are designed around an inclusion setting. I found the lecture very enlightening. I have more pages from the packet including a PowerPoint if anyone would like to view them. The presenters were from Pioneer RESA. They gave us setups for the classroom and how to arrange the children so that the students were getting the most out of having two teachers in the room. The presenters were extremely enthusiastic about using a center style approach to learning. They believed that the students would gain the most from this style by having the personal time with each instructor as well as, being given the opportunity to bond with their classmates within their group.