Cooperative Learning

Because of the new vocabulary introduced in many nonfiction works, it's helpful for young people to have the support of a peer. This works well in online reading situations. Students read the screen together and work on a shared activity. They're able to share the "wow" moments that occur when discovering new information.

Read the Scholastic article Reading Partnership and notice their reproducibles.

Read articles from websites in pairs. Ask students to stop each paragraph and share one thing they learned. Encourage them to move from recalling basic facts to reflecting on the contents (i.e., questions, opinions, perspectives).

Science and Cooperative Learning

Focus on Systems. Focus on a variety of readings that can be shared. Consider topics that have multiple categories that can be compared.

• KidsHealth
• Read a chapter on bones in Moving and Growing (Google Limited Preview) by Louise Spilsbury, Claire Llewellyn, Richard Spilsbury.
• Read The Way We Work by David Macaulay
• Follow directions to learn about Bones.
• The Skeletal System (Google Limited Preview) by Caroline Arnold
• Read articles from Powerful Girls Have Powerful Bones. Notice the glossary.

Focus on Models. Go to Making Rocks. Compare the model of the volcano to the scientist's real-world experiment.

Science Standards

• Science Standard 2.1.5. Demonstrate the ability to work with a team but still reach and communicate one's own conclusions about findings.
• Science Standard 3.1.5. Demonstrate the ability to work cooperatively while respecting the ideas of others and communicating one's own conclusions about findings.
• Science Standard 3.6.3. Explain how a model of something is different from the real thing but can be used to learn something about the real thing.
• Science Standard 4.6.3. Recognize that and describe how changes made to a model can help predict how the real thing can be altered.
• Science Standard 5.6.2. Demonstrate how geometric figures, number sequences, graphs, diagrams, sketches, number lines, maps, and stories can be used to represent objects, events, and processes in the real world, although such representations can never be exact in every detail.
• Science Standard 6.7.2. Use models to illustrate processes that happen too slowly, too quickly, or on too small a scale to observe directly, or are too vast to be changed deliberately, or are potentially dangerous.
• Science Standard 7.7.2. Use different models to represent the same thing, noting that the kind of model and its complexity should depend on its purpose.
• Science Standard 8.7.3. Use technology to assist in graphing and with simulations that compute and display results of changing factors in models.

Literature Circles

Identify and rotate roles of children within the literature circle groups. Harvey Daniels suggests the roles of Literary Luminary (finds sections to read aloud), Discussion Director (creates and introduces questions), Vocabulary Enricher (identified words to explore), Connector (finds links between text and people, places, or events), and Artful Artis (sketches a scene or identifies related photographs).