By Saman Hassan
I have been reading a lot of articles about the importance of collaboration and group work lately. Much of this has been connected to general English classes rather than my own area of expertise, which is young learners, and so in this article I want to share how collaboration and group work can find their place in the Young Learner classroom.
Collaborative learning and teamwork bring many benefits. Whether it is the development of social skills, emotional evolution, better concept retention, boosting language development and expression, encouraging problem solving, or promoting empathy and inclusion, group work and collaboration contain much value for the early years learner.
However, that is not to suggest that bringing group work activities into the Young Learner classroom is always easy. Adults understand the importance of working together, and have much more experience to draw from when you put them into groups. Teenagers are likewise able to see the point of group activities, and can find themselves more readily in a team – though some still need help developing the social skills required here. Young Learners, though, are likely at the very beginning of the long road to understanding social position and social expectations. From my own experience, Young Learners are likely to be more selfish or self-centered than older learners; they do not have readymade collaborative skills; they cannot always keep their own emotions in check; and they have a poorer grasp of group goals than most older learners.
These, of course, are good reasons to want to incorporate group activities in the Young Learner classroom – the skills these students might lack will not suddenly appear on their own, and as teachers it is our task to help our students realise their full potential, not just their language-learning potential.
Here are four group activities that I have found work well with younger students.
Group Activity 1: Trash Turns into Treasure
As the name suggests, this activity mainly consisted of getting the most out of trash items, household clutter, and discarded materials by crafting something valuable and worth keeping.
Using discarded cardboard, pencil shavings, plastic bottles and caps, paper bags, straws, tin cans, and tissue paper rolls, students can make different items like robots, picture frames, butterflies, sea creatures, flower vases, and pencil holders.
This activity is a nice introduction into the world of recycling, and perhaps even into upcycling, since thrown-away items take on a new life.
The collaborative element is simple – the students all bring something to class that we can use in the arts and crafts activity. This introduces a sense of communal responsibility, and encourages sharing – the learners do not necessarily use only those items that they brought to class. The students can also work in groups on their project, so that the treasure is owned by more than one person, thus strengthening the sense of community. A word of caution here, though – young learners are naturally possessive, and there could be upset feelings at the end of the year if the treasure is sent home with the students. Make sure that everyone has something to take with them, or consider keeping everything at school instead, to show next year’s students.
Group Activity 2: Technology Playmates
This group activity aims to familiarise Young Learners with computer systems and software. Though this was quite a challenging task as it involved showing children how to use the computer, it was my most enjoyable experience. Technology is all around us, and most children will already have some experience even with AI tools and social media – though if they do not approach technology with the right mindset, it can quickly move from being a tool to being a source of danger.
For this activity I went a little old-fashioned by focusing not on AI tools, but on the Microsoft Paint application. This took something the children already regarded as fun – drawing and colouring-in are popular parts of any Young Learner class – and added a technological dimension to it, so that the students could learn how to save their work, and to find that work once it had been saved.
The collaborative part of this activity came in the form of interaction with the computer, which by design could only involve one student at a time. The learners worked in groups of four, with one at the computer while the other three guided what was going on – suggesting which drawing option to use, which colours to select, and so forth.
The biggest problem with this activity is, of course, what to do with the students who are waiting for their turn to come around. One solution would be to give every group of students access of some kind to technology – easily done if you have access to a computer lab or tablet devices. Alternatively, this could be an opportunity to experiment with rotating groupwork – set up three or four different activities around the room for the groups to do, though you’ll have to make sure to monitor closely while they work.
Group Activity 3: The Open Day
This might not be possible in all language schools, as it requires the involvement of parents and grandparents as well as the students themselves – and depending on your school’s policies, this might be difficult to arrange or downright impossible. Still, it ranks among my favourite activities, as it instils a sense of community both inside and outside the classroom.
The idea is simple – we invited the parents to come and visit us in class.
In the weeks leading up to the event, the learners developed and practiced some short group presentations that they could make at their ‘stalls’ (these were just their desks but moved to the side of the room as you might find in the publishers’ section of an EFL conference).
Some students gave short presentations on spelling rules in English, while others presented simple games like Kim’s Game or Pelmanism.
Besides bringing everyone together, this was also a collaborative activity in that it encouraged positive feedback from one student to another. We rehearsed the whole day beforehand, with some students pretending to be adults going around sampling the offer at each stall, and then the ‘adults’ gave some helpful tips to improve what we were doing.
Another key feature of the event was a self-expression session in which students were asked to present any idea, thought, story, poem, or whatever they had to offer, followed by giveaways and prizes. This encouraged the students to become more open and to develop their public-speaking skills, as well as how to be a better and more supportive audience member!
Group Activity 4: Science Fusion
This group activity involved hands-on learning of science concepts like cloud formation, plant and animal life cycles, skeletons and body parts, etc. Some of the activities here were similar to those I discussed in my previous article for the IH Journal about the use of STEM with Young Learners.
Every group was allowed to choose an activity from the list, and the relevant material was provided. One of the groups created a balloon-powered cart that accelerated each time the attached balloon at its end was deflated. In this way, the group learnt the basics of motion. Another group created a skeleton by using cotton bud sticks. One presented the concept of buoyancy using balls of different weights and sizes and a water container.
In one way or another, every student learnt something of value. Also, this group approach resulted in a better retention of concepts, as well as offering an opportunity to practice teamwork and assigning roles to members of the team.
Conclusion
One of the most important lessons I learned as a teacher from my experiments in the Young Learner classroom has been that nothing exists in a vacuum. What I mean by that is that adding group activities and developing my learners’ collaborative skills has worked best when I have also adapted some of my regular lesson activities so that they involve some form of collaboration and group work. If my learners think that they only have to work together nicely when I put them into larger groups, they will think conversely that they don’t need to use their new collaborative skills when they are working solo in their workbooks.
Some of the little changes I have made include assigning responsibilities to members of the class – so, for example, if someone wants to sharpen their pencil, they have to ask the person responsible for classroom materials to borrow the pencil sharpener rather than using their own. Likewise, whenever we do a colouring-in activity, I try to turn it into a pair dictation – one student points at the picture and says “What colour should this be?”, for instance.
When you first take on a Young Learner class, don’t be surprised if group activities fail to work as you expect. Teamwork and collaborative skills need to be nurtured – they will grow, but they need the right conditions, and that is what we are there to provide!
Author Biography
Saman Hassan, a young and ambitious educator who has been working in a school as an early childhood educator for 2 years, is passionate about educating today’s youth. She has completed online educational courses, aimed at supporting a child academically, emotionally, and socially. Saman strives to bring forth dedication, skill, and a desire to positively impact the lives of children. She likes to read books, magazines, and write articles in her free time.
