The Joy of Collaboration

Prompt:  The ideal collaboration between students - what would it look like?

I completely love student collaboration, but it hasn't always been that way.  In my first couple of years teaching, I firmly believed that students should limit the amount of time they completed their assignments with their peers.  I truly believed that each student should complete their own work because how else was I going to be able to measure their comprehension of the material covered in my class.  Looking back, only one thing comes to mind - what the heck was I thinking?

As teachers, we are always borrowing and collaborating from other teachers.  The old adage goes - two heads are better than one ... so why wasn't I allowing for my students to do the same thing?  I moved away from the single student learning approach and slowly geared my classes towards a collaborative setting.  It's still a learning process for me because I know what I want from my students, but to see it translated in the classroom is a difficult process.  The emphasis in that last sentence should be on process, because the definition of collaboration is always changing and adapting to the students that walk through the door.

Student collaboration should bring out the best traits of each student, and allow for the other members of a team or network to see and appreciate the value each student brings to the group dynamic.  A collaboration between students should be respectful while boundaries are being pushed to their limit. I would love to see students gaining a new understanding of a topic/issue because another students has challenged them to see their point of view.  Student collaboration is the essence of learning because each student will most likely connect with their peers than with a teacher.  So the dream-like appearance of student collaboration would involve constant questioning accompanied with an in-depth discussion of a topic or project design.  The only thing left for a teacher to do is to make the dream a reality.

-A