Listening Teams

Listening Teams (Full-Class Learning)

OVERVIEW

This activity is a way to help students stay focused and alert during a lecture-based lesson. Listening teams create small groups responsible for clarifying class material.

PROCEDURE

1. Divide the students into four teams, and give the teams these assignments:
TEAM	ROLE	ASSIGNMENT
1	Questioners	After the lecture-based lesson, ask at least two questions about the material covered.
2	Agreers	After the lecture-based lesson, tell which points they agreed with (or found helpful) and explain why.
3	Nay-sayers	After the lecture-based lesson, comment on which point they disagreed with (or found unhelpful) and explain why.
4	Example givers	After the lecture-based lesson, give specific examples or applications of the material.

2. Present your lecture-based lesson. After it is over, give teams a few moments to complete their assignments.

3. Call on each team to question, to agree, and so forth. You should obtain more student participation than you ever imagined.

VARIATIONS

1. Create other roles. For example, ask a team to summarize the lecture-based lesson, or ask a team to create questions that test students' understanding of the material.

2. Give out questions in advance that will be answered in the lecture-based lesson. Challenge students to listen for the answers. The team that can answer the most questions wins.