Building Community Through Intentional Groupings

When students feel like they belong and know that they are part of a classroom community, they are better able to show their strengths and take risks that help them grow. There are many different ways teachers can work to build and strengthen their classroom communities throughout the school year. One of my favorite ways to do this is through intentional grouping.

When students work together in pairs or in small groups, they have the chance to be seen and heard by their classmates, which nurtures that crucial sense of belonging. Plus, when students work together and find success, or experience productive struggle together, they feel more connected to one another and the things they are working on in class.

CONSIDERATIONS FOR EFFECTIVE GROUPING

In my classroom, I create groupings that students work in anytime we have a partner or small group activity. Students work with those same partners until I rearrange all of our groups. By keeping students in the same groupings for multiple activities, often multiple weeks at a time, students learn to trust one another and are better able to navigate challenging content. But, I want to ensure that students have the chance to work with and learn from multiple people in the room, so I rearrange the groupings every few weeks.

When I group students, I think carefully about individual strengths and personalities in order to make the best matches. If one student tends to be quiet, I will partner them with someone who is a little less quiet rather than the most talkative classmate. In this way, they are more similar in communication and can both have chances to shine.

When considering partners for multilingual students, I often opt for a triad if a student is a newcomer, so that they have two English language models to listen to and learn alongside, ideally one of whom is also multilingual.

When I tell students who their partners or triads are, I remind them that I don’t make these groupings randomly: I make these groupings with student strengths and areas for growth in mind so that everyone has both the chance to shine and the chance to deepen their own understandings and skills through working collaboratively.

SUPPORTING STUDENTS IN THEIR GROUPINGS

Before students begin working together, I like to use interactive modeling to help them understand what effective collaboration and listening look like: I ask one student to be my partner, and the rest of the class observes as we model a partner discussion.

In our model, I begin by turning to face my partner and asking them to do the same. Next, I ask my partner a question such as, “Which character was your favorite in the story?” After my partner answers, I paraphrase what they said and ask another question, “Your favorite character was ___. Why were they your favorite?” Then my partner asks me the same questions.

After we model this for the class, I ask the rest of the class to share what they noticed us doing that showed that we were engaged and actively listening. I then give groupings an opportunity to practice with a few simple questions, like “What is your favorite thing to do outside of school?” before they work together on our class content.

While students are working together in their groupings after they have seen the model and practiced, I circulate the room and observe students to gauge how well the groupings are working. I will provide in-the-moment feedback when needed: For example, if a student is dominating the conversation, I may step in and encourage them to hear what their partner thinks; or, alternatively, if neither partner is speaking, I may step in and provide some prompting questions to get them started.

Sometimes, I meet with one of the students individually to provide tips they can use to be more successful in their grouping. For example, if a student is taking over more of the work and not listening as much to group mates, I may meet with them to offer some sentence frames to ask their partners: “What do you think? How else might we do this?

As I observe, I also determine when it is time to switch up the groupings. I like to switch up the groupings every few weeks to ensure that students have time to connect with multiple people in the room, but I may keep groups working together a bit longer if it seems like they need more time to develop their trust and communication skills.

Alternatively, if groups are working very smoothly, I may switch them up a bit quicker, since students are demonstrating that they are ready to transfer those interpersonal skills to a new relationship.

Over time, students improve their ability to communicate clearly and collaborate effectively as they work within different groupings throughout the year. I’ve been so impressed with how my students learn to listen to their classmates’ ideas and the ways in which they encourage one another while working to solve a difficult problem or answer a hard question.

Strategically grouping students and shifting those groupings throughout the year means my students have the chance to work with, get to know, and learn from multiple different classmates.

All of the conversations they have and the successes they experience together help every student feel seen and valued in the classroom. This creates the kind of classroom environment I strive for: one where every student feels like they belong.