Collaboration

**Incorporating Collaboration **

**How will you facilitate an authentic collaborative learning experience to promote deeper student engagement with content skills and concepts? ** To facilitate collaborative learning experience, I will form heterogeneous groups with students from each grade level. The students are required to chat or communicate weekly and create a wiki for their project. Each group is responsible for responding to the other groups’ wiki pages and completing a Wiki Response Worksheet. After discussing the other groups’ wiki projects, a representative must post the responses. The group’s final project will be a collaboration summary of the students’ engagement and knowledge.

As the instructor, I will facilitate each group of students. I plan to provide references, resources, technology sources and tutorials. I will design each lesson to have collective data, opportunities to analyze data and an opportunity for students to take their data to develop a solution for the issue. The groups will provide a transcript about their collaboration activities. The groups are also required to complete a   (created by the instructor).
 * As members of collaborative groups, how will you support students’ efforts to identify solutions to the problem you are using as the framework for your PBL instructional unit? **

The collaborative groups will consist of four students and will include at least one student from each grade level (9th – 12th). The students will form their own groups based on the criteria. If any problems occur, I will resolve the issue(s) as the facilitator.
 * What criteria will you use to assign learners to collaborative groups, including a rationale? What will be the size of the collaborative groups you will include in your unit? **

The digital tools and websites will be as follows: Communication: Anymeeting, Google Docs, Email, ooVoo, Skype, Chat, and FaceTime Presentation Tools: Wikis (wikispaces, wikihow, or pbworks), Prezi, Voice Thread, Glogster, Pixton, Microsoft Office and WebQuest Resources: Paper Rater and Tutorial videos Video Recording Tools: digital cameras, webcam, and/or cell phones Video Editing Software: Windows Live Movie Maker, or iMovie
 * Which digital tools and websites are you considering for collaboration in your unit? **

The groups are assessed in the following categories: collaboration, multimedia projects or live presentations and writing. The groups are required to demonstrate their collaboration by submitting a transcript, pictures, videos (some type of recorded copy) or notes and agendas from the collaborative time. Rubrics are used to calculate groups’ points for collaboration, multimedia projects and writing.
 * <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">How will you assess participation of the students in their collaborative groups? **

<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Resources: <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Cennamo, K.S., Ross, J.D., and Ertmer, P.A. (2010). Technology integration for meaningful <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"> Classroom use: A standards-based approach. Wadsworth Cengage Learning. <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Teaching and learning resources instructional strategies. Retrieved on June 28, 2012. <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">[] <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Novel approach. Retrieved on August 25, 2010. <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">[] <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">.