As the educational teacher for this group of students, it is my responsibility to guide them in their current task. The goal for my students is to develop an understanding of interdependence within ecosystems by examining how plants and animals interrelate in a saltwater marsh. I will be using the Student Teams Achievement Division (STAD) strategy for the assessment of my group. STAD in most appropriate for teaching well-defined objectives, such as mathematical computations and applications, language usage and mechanics, geography and map skills, and science facts and concepts. (Slavin 2001)
In this learning model, I will first give a presentation to the students so that they understand the lesson. I will then assign students to teams of four by looking at their abilities, gender, race, and previous test scores. The students will then be asked to move their desks together to assure that they are working as a team. I will give every team two worksheets, a short quiz, and some pictures relating to saltwater marsh plants and animals. They will also receive two answer sheets that will guide their discussions and help them study. Team members will quiz each other on the material until every member of the team understands in order to achieve mastery of new concepts, and confirm individual mastery. STAD encourages students to be responsible for members of their group and well as themselves and promotes teamwork.
Using this organization in my classroom, I will be able to help students work together, promote good communication skills, and strive for better grades. While all the students will be graded as a group, they will each need to be familiar with the terms salt marsh, tide, cordgrass, marsh hay, burrow, and gills and incorporate them into a paragraph. The quiz technique in a small group will allow each student to understand the material effectively.
After each team has had ample time to identify and describe facts regarding saltwater marsh plant and animals, they will take individual quizzes based on course content. They will not be able to help each other. After the quiz, each student will be given a quiz score and an improvement score that I will