Monday Made It - Cooperative Learning Tools

I'm still on a cooperative learning kick!! This week I made some helpful tools for my cooperative learning structures. In a previous post, I mentioned that I love Kagan, but their tools are a little pricey. This week I borrowed their idea of learning chips. {I love these...the possibilities are endless!} I basically used their template and typed different question stems. After punching out the circles and laminating, I used spray adhesive and attached them to cheap poker chips. So far I have made the chips for non-fiction texts, paraphrasing, science, and pre-reading. I will make 1 set for each table group {roughly 6 sets of each} I plan to add several more! {Here is a great article on using learning chips in the classroom!} This was a pretty inexpensive projects {actually free} since I already had the spray adhesive, laminator, and chips. I just had to print them on cardstock. :) Love it when I already have all of the materials for a project! *******UPDATE I WILL BE MAKING THE CHIPS AND OFFERING THEM IN MY STORE SOON!!! Until then, enter to win 3 sets- Non-fiction, Pre-reading, and the science sets!! {enter at the bottom of the page} - I'll pick 5 lucky winners {Thanks Tara for the idea!} Good luck!

I also jumped on the bandwagon and made the dry erase boards using duct tape and report covers. However, I changed mine up a bit! I searched high and low for cheap report covers. The best deal I found was 3 for a dollar something, and they had a frosted cover. So I got home to see what I could use instead. I have several boxes of transparencies...and I don't even have an overhead in my room anymore! I tried the dry erase marker and it works perfectly! I basically just took 2 transparencies and taped around 3 sides so I could slip a piece of paper in. The transparencies are slightly smaller than the report covers, so any papers I slip in will have to be trimmed just slightly. I love how they turned out! This project was also pretty inexpensive since I already had the transparencies on hand. I just bought 2 rolls of the duct tape (around 3.50 each). I also tried the packing tape, but it didn't work as well for me! I plan to have one for each student at the table and wouldn't you know this is also a Kagan tool! I love the dry erase markers from Ikea. They are super cheap and are perfect for these boards!! {Please excuse the black lines - I haven't had a chance to erase them yet ;) }

On another note, I had to select another winner because the last one didn't respond! So congratulations Cindy Toalson! Please contact me so I can give you all of your AWESOME prizes!!!

Now go link up with Tara and share what you made this week!

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Cooperative Learning Tools - Training, Training & more training

I'm sorry for being MIA, I packed most of my summer training in the past week and this week! My head is still spinning from all of the wonderful ideas I got. I attended trainings on iPads, writing with Barry Lane & Gretchen Bernabei, and Kagan cooperative learning. They were all fabulous!!

I really enjoyed the Kagan training. I have never been to an official Kagan training before, but it is all we used during undergrad. I was fortunate to have a professor who is a Kagan trainer. {If you have a chance - I highly suggest going!} The one I went to was a 2 day conference that focused on ELL's.  It is amazing how well cooperative structures lend themselves to students acquiring a new language!

While I really love Kagan and all of their materials, a lot of their things are EXPENSIVE!!! I highly suggest to spend the $$$ on the trainings & books - they're worth it. However, for tools, I borrow their ideas and come up with alternatives.

Timers & Selectors

For timers, I love to use online-stopwatch, they have very cute timers! They even have an interval timer, that you can set up for teams and have 4 different timers going {similar to Kagan's bar timer} There are also tons of timers for Smartboards.

Selectors are another really fun tool! If you have your students set up in groups of 4, I always have each student numbered {#1-4}, with these selectors, you can either put students names or just the numbers 1, 2, 3, & 4 {similar to how Kagan's work}

• Random Name Selector - you can either put your Ss name in there, or you can just put #1-4 and it will select one. It also has a stopwatch on the same site. The best part, it saves your student's names!

• Dart Selector - is another cute one, but it doesn't save your list of names or numbers, so you may have to keep it up on your screen at all times. 

• Super Teacher Tools - You can create a class (either by name/#) and use it as a name selector, but you can also use it to randomly creates students into groups. It saves your info too!

• Random Name Picker - This will allow you to enter student names/#'s and it uses a slot machine to choose the name/#.

• Stick Pick - iPhone app. This one is pretty fancy and keeps track of correct responses by students. 

• Smartboard - name generators & group creator.

• Kagan also has some apps that are pretty inexpensive {2.99 each} for selectors & timers!

I have lots of ideas for some of their other tools - and I will share with you as I make them! Here are some other great resources that I have found that are either free or very inexpensive!

• Kagan Free articles - This section is full of free resources!

• Cooperative 365- A blog dedicated to cooperative learning and has amazing resources!

• Cooperative Learning Seating chart

• Laura Candler's resources - tons of great ideas and resources!

Don't forget to enter my giveaway - there are LOTS of great prizes!!!!