Small Group Instruction Research Articles

Social Skills Instruction for Students at Risk for Antisocial Behavior: The Effects of Small-Group Instruction

This study examined the effectiveness of social skills instruction for seven elementary-age students at risk for antisocial behavior who were unresponsive to a schoolwide primary intervention program. Students received instruction in social skills in a small-group setting over a 10-week period. A comprehensive list of acquisition deficits was generated for each student using an empirically validated assessment tool. These acquisition deficits became the core content of each intervention group. Results revealed lasting decreases in both disruptive behaviors in the classroom and negative social interactions on the playground. Students also experienced increases in percentage of academic engaged time. Findings from a social validity measure indicated that students viewed the intervention procedures as acceptable and reportedly used the newly acquired skills in multiple settings. Limitations are discussed, and directions for future research are provided.

Learning with Technology

Suggests that in a constructivist setting, the computer must facilitate social interaction among students and provide for independent acquisition of shared knowledge. Considers how to best use computers in the modern classroom. Proposes that it is the function of the arrangement of the computer pod to provide effective small group instruction

The First Clinical Skill: Students Teach Students to Take Vital Signs

:Transition from the role of passive student to medical practitioner begins with learning the first clinical skill. This transition can be stressful for those experiencing it and to some extent by those coordinating it. Logistically, it requires demonstration of the techniques to the entire class by a single practitioner or to smaller groups of students by multiple practitioners. The former reduces the opportunity for close observation of technique and is less conducive to questions, while the latter requires multiple practitioners, which can be prohibitive given their already dense schedules. To reduce the stress for all involved and to maximize learning opportunities, an innovative approach to teaching the first skill, vital signs measurement, was developed. Small group instruction and practice were facilitated by senior medical student volunteers in a simulated outpatient clinic using actual equipment. Instruction was provided in a relaxed, but guided format. Students were provided with a lesson plan that detailed both, technique and brief physiology points, as well as check sheets to use during the lab and later as a refresher guide. The lesson plan, instructions for facilitators, and student check sheets were developed by a senior medical student and reviewed by the course faculty. Recruitment and briefing of student facilitators and conduct of the lab were also performed by the senior student. The purpose of this trend article is to describe the development of a new course format and to report our experience with implementation of the new format. It is intended to spark interest in applying similar approaches to other curricular issues.

The Effects of Social Skills Instruction on the Social Behaviors of Students at Risk for Emotional or Behavioral Disorders

The authors examined the effects of pullout small-group and teacher-directed classroom-based social skills instruction on the social behaviors of five third- and fourth-grade students at risk for emotional or behavioral disorders. A multiple-baseline across-subjects design was conducted to determine whether the combination of small-group and classroom-based social skills instruction would reduce the frequency of antisocial behaviors across two settings (i.e., classroom, lunchroom). Results of the study indicated moderate reductions in antisocial behaviors during small-group social skills instruction. The positive changes either further declined or were maintained after classroom social skills instruction commenced. Training variables are discussed.

Cutting Edge Techniques in Intramural Sports Officials' Development

Many professionals have identified the crucial role of officiating in determining the success of an intramural sports program. Topics such as recruiting, retention, training, motivation, and evaluation have endured over time as critical aspects in managing these personnel. However, the landscape of sports officials' development itself has changed dramatically over the past decade. New approaches that are more effective have replaced the old traditional methods in many cases. These changes reflect a transition that encompasses philosophical, practical, and implementation elements. New recruiting methods include increased pay, specialized brochures, webpages, online applications, and promotional videos. Extramural assignments, “memorable moments” championship game experiences, assuming booking duties for outside recreational leagues, and mentor programs are among the new techniques implemented for retention/recognition. There is greater computer use to schedule officials, as well as establishing “crews” for the season. The area of training has undergone a significant transformation. Locating outstanding clinicians, access to NIRSA-sponsored educational workshops, the development of “approved” clinicians certification, greater usage of practical application teaching stations, emphasis on small-group instruction, and technological innovations are changing the way sports officials are trained. Sports officials' performance assessment is now done in a variety of ways. Audiotape, webpage forms, and videotaping, just some of the more effective techniques to study and critique the official's skills and abilities, are replacing old observation and evaluation forms.

Horizontal and vertical integration of academic disciplines in the medical school curriculum.

A rapid expansion of new scientific information and the introduction of new technology in operative and diagnostic medicine has marked the last several decades. Medical educators, because of and parallel to these developments, initiated a search for a more effective system of presenting core material to medical students. The new educational trends, although varying somewhat from one institution to another, concentrated on the following pedagogical shifts: 1) expansion of conceptual presentation of material at the expense of detail-oriented education; 2) amplification of an integrated approach, as opposed to subject-oriented instruction; 3) scheduling of elective courses to compliment required courses in the curriculum; and 4) institution of small group instruction (i.e., problem-based learning) to actively involve students in the educational process and to develop deductive reasoning based on clinical cases. The future pedagogical system in medical schools will most likely be a combination of "classical" presentation of material combined with concept-oriented, subject-integrated and small group instruction based on either hypothetical or real clinical cases. It is imperative for the success of the new curriculum, however, that certain criteria are satisfied: 1) reorganize basic science departments to determine course ownership; 2) establish a reward system for teaching faculty; and 3) establish new course objectives.

Children's Self-Regulatory Behaviors During Teacher-Directed, Seat-Work, and Small-Group Instructional Contexts

The authors examined differences between children's self-regulatory behaviors in 3 instructional contexts: teacher directed, seat work, and small group. Fifty-one 3rd-grade students were observed throughout the school year during mathematics and science lessons. During teacher-directed instruction, students were less likely to attend to instructions, monitor their work, and ask for help than during seat work or small-group instruction. However, students were more likely to be disorganized during seat work or small-group instruction than during teacher-directed instruction. Students were more likely to talk about their thinking during small-group instruction than during teacher-directed instruction or seat work. Four types of students participated: students who were consistently self-regulated across all contexts, students who were consistently unregulated, students who excelled in small groups, and students who excelled during seat work.

What General Educators Have To Say About Successfully Including Students With Down Syndrome in Their Classes

The purpose of this study was to review the instructor and classroom management procedures of those general education teachers involved in the inclusion of children with Down syndrome who have been rated as successful by the children's parents. Using a parent affiliate list provided by the National Down Syndrome Society, 250 questionnaires were mailed to families in the United States. From this group, 195 parents indicated that they thought their children were included successfully, and they then forwarded questionnaires to their children's general education inclusion teachers. Of those, 189 teachers, from kindergarten through 12th grade, returned their questionnaires. According to the reports from the teachers designated by parents as successfully including students with Down syndrome in their classes, praise was the best motivator for the children with Down syndrome and the most effective learning methods were individual and small-group instruction, hands-on activities, and the use of computers for practice and drill. When asked for recommendations to improve the inclusion model, the teachers suggested more planning time to modify assignments and tests, more individual instruction time built into the schedule, and more information on learning characteristics of children with Down syndrome.

Critical Elements of Classroom and Small‐Group Instruction Promote Reading Success in All Children

The components of effective reading instruction are the same whether the focus is prevention or intervention: phonemic awareness and phonemic decoding skills, fluency in word recognition and text processing, construction of meaning, vocabulary, spelling, and writing. Findings from evidence‐based research show dramatic reductions in the incidence of reading failure when explicit instruction in these components is provided by the classroom teacher. To address the needs of children most at risk of reading failure, the same instructional components are relevant but they need to be made more explicit and comprehensive, more intensive, and more supportive in small‐group or one‐on‐one formats. The argument is made that by coordinating research evidence from effective classroom reading instruction with effective small‐group and one‐on‐one reading instruction we can meet the literacy needs of all children.

Leadership Through Language and Literacy: How Immigrants Repositioned Themselves into Active Community Participants Through Classroom Discourse

First we wanted to improve our skills but now we understand we need more than basic skills. We want not only to survive, but we want to thrive and be connected to our society. Literacy is the act of knowing the world. Literacy gives us more choices for change and more power. Literacy opens our mind to look at reasons and things in different ways. We want students to develop citizenship, get involved in civil society and get involved in their own community. We want to create an equal environment. (From a written document prepared collectively by the students of the Leadership Group for a national meeting of the Lila Wallace Libraries and Literacy initiative, 1999). Write to Read Program--Alameda County Library In 1984, a federal grant allowed several California libraries to launch an ambitious initiative to include literacy services within the range of library services offered to the community Alameda County, using a volunteer one-to-one model based on the Laubach method of reading instruction, opened its doors to provide tutoring services. Since then, the program has evolved, offering small group tutoring, using professionally trained staff with some volunteer support, and providing additional individual tutoring when necessary. Today, the curriculum no longer centers around work books; teachers use a variety of texts with themes that reflect the concerns articulated by students in the program. When the Lila Wallace Reader's Digest Fund approached us with a funding opportunity, our program had already launched several projects to encourage student leadership and participation. Some of our students were involved with Key to the Community, a state library-funded initiative to foster civic participation among adult literacy students. These students, along with others in the San Francisco Bay Area, helped publish an Easy Reader Voter's Guide for new readers. Another group of our students organized Action for Children's Education (ACE) by researching, developing and distributing a brochure to alert other families about ways to advocate for their school-age children. A new opportunity presented itself in 1997 when the Lila Wallace Libraries and Literacy Initiative (1997-99) wanted to expand literacy efforts by moving from individual to small group instruction. They determined that our program could be a possible model and awarded us funding for three years. These monies were used to afford students the opportunity to engage in a discourse atypical of many literacy and ESL classrooms. I have chosen to write about the Read to Write Program because the students found the process provocative, exciting, and life changing -and because this project changed the face of our program. Although we no longer have a leadership class, some students are currently working as administrators or teachers in the program. They are operating at the national level of adult literacy policy and continuing to link community concerns to our literacy classes. Their voices are represented throughout this paper. quotes I have inserted were collected though individual interviews and several focus groups conducted upon formal completion of the project. Some quotes are taken directly from written journals or periodic evaluations kept by the students. I have provided pseudonyms for the students involved to maintain their privacy. Who Were Students? During the program's three-year sponsorship, we enrolled a number of different students in what became known as The Leadership Class. Fifteen students volunteered on the first night we announced the program; though, as the project evolved it became apparent that many of the students were primarily interested in a space to practice their English. As the goals of the class became clearer, only those students interested in stronger community involvement remained with the project. Table 1 features the participants who stayed the duration of the program. …

The Effectiveness of a Group Reading Instruction Program with Poor Readers in Multiple Grades

The effectiveness of a phonologically based reading program delivered to first- through sixth-grade impaired readers in small groups (3–5) was examined. The 115 students from a predominantly low socioeconomic school were selected based on poor phonetic decoding and word-level reading skills, then matched and randomly assigned to one of two groups. The treatment group received the Spell Read program for eight weeks while the no-treatment control received only regular classroom reading instruction. At posttest-1 the treatment group performed significantly better than the controls on phonological awareness and decoding, reading accuracy, comprehension and spelling. Except for fluency, effect sizes were strong for most measures across all grades. Improved reading skills as a result of the phonological program were evident regardless of level of deficiency prior to instruction, and were not limited to specific grades. Outcome scores at posttest-2 after the control group was also given the Spell Read program indicated similar growth in reading. Results provide supportive evidence for small-group instruction as an effective remedial alternative for deficient readers.

Effects of Within-Class Grouping on Student Achievement: An Exploratory Model

In this meta-analysis, the authors attempted to develop a parsimonious model of factors that account for the significant variability in the findings on the effects of within-class grouping on student achievement. Two weighted least squares regression models were tested using 103 independent findings from 51 studies at elementary through postsecondary grades. Results indicate that the most important study features that accounted for 48% of the total variance include outcome measure source, teacher training equivalence, grouping basis, type of small-group instruction method, grade level, and relative ability of students. Goodness-of-fit statistics indicate that the model fits the data and that the remaining variance may be explained by sampling errors.

University of Wisconsin Medical School.

University of Wisconsin Medical School.

Saint Louis University School of Medicine

Saint Louis University School of Medicine

Introduction and evaluation of a modular seminar system in gross anatomy teaching at the hannover medical school

We present a new modular seminar system which has been introduced into the gross anatomy teaching at the Hannover Medical School. It consists of seven modules with a clinical emphasis. The new modular seminar system was evaluated by an anonymous questionnaire. The results showed that the seminar system as a whole, and the different modules with one exception were highly appreciated by the students. The evaluation also revealed that the main reason for the success of a module is the manner of the teaching and learning rather than the clinical relevance. Taking into account the results of this evaluation we describe the appropriate style of teaching for use in a seminar. The success of this new approach to small group instruction in Germany should encourage other teachers of anatomy and other undergraduate subjects to consider new methods of teaching.

Why Should We Group Students Within-Class for Learning?

The purpose of this article is threefold. First, we bring to the attention of the European and international research community the research evidence concerning within-class grouping. In a previous quantitative review, we computed 103 independent effect sizes from studies comparing within-class instruction and whole class instruction. The mean weighted effect size (ES) of within-class versus no grouping on student achievement was 0.17, which was significantly greater than zero (p < .05). We also reported that the findings were statistically heterogeneous and explored which of 26 study features accounted for the variability. Second, we address the issues related to our research integration raised by Prais (1998, 1999). We argue that our review focused only on grouping effects on students, not other features of classroom organization or teacher outcomes. We also believe that our data suggest that Continental Education would be further enhanced by the use of small group instruction. In particular, our findings are: useful; not so variable as to be meaningless; provide evidence of beneficial effects for students of all relative abilities; are thorough and detailed; and provide a rather complete picture of the available evidence. Third, we elaborate further on the pedagogical techniques which encourage effective small group instruction. We describe cooperative learning in general, the important elements of positive interdependence and individual accountability in particular, and summarize reviews of research on its effectiveness. We remain convinced that educators should group students within-class for learning and rely on the research evidence for guidance in doing so.

Literacy and bilingualism: a handbook for all teachers

Contents: Preface. Literacy and Bilingualism. Working Effectively With Bilingual Students. Approaches With Focus on Writing. Approaches With Focus on Reading. Approaches With Focus on Oral Discourse. Approaches With Focus on Language. Approaches With Focus on Teaching Literacy in the Content Areas. Individualized and Small Group Instruction With Support of Tutors. Learning From Students' Performance. Appendix A: Protocol to Gather Information About Learners. Appendix B: Books With Multicultural Themes. Appendix C: Popular Books Taught in American English and Language Arts Classes. Appendix D: Books to Supplement Content Area Instruction for ELL Students. Appendix E: Assessment Practices.

Comparison of Phonological Training Procedures in Kindergarten Classrooms

The authors compared the effect of 2 phonological training procedures—segmenting and blending, or first sound identification and rhyming—on the acquisition of reading and spelling skills among kindergarten children. Sixty-one low-skilled kindergartners were assigned randomly to 1 of 2 strategy groups. Children received 20–30 min of instruction in small groups that met twice a week for 10 weeks. Both groups improved significantly in the target skills and in reading and spelling. No significant differences were found between groups on skill acquisition, transfer to untaught skills, or generalization to reading and spelling. Children demonstrated weaker evidence for transfer and generalization than that reported earlier. The results are discussed in terms of treatment differences and support for stimulating generalization.

Searching for the best cognitive model for instructing students with learning disabilities: A component and composite analysis

The purpose of this paper is to identify the components of various cognitive instructional models that best predicted effect sizes for students with learning disabilities. Based on an exploratory analysis, eight models were identified: Direct instruction (sequencing &amp; segmentation), explicit strategy training, monitoring, individualised remedial training, small interactive group instruction, teacher-indirect instruction, verbal questioning/attribution instruction, and technology mediated instruction. The models were tested in a hierarchical weighted least square regression analysis. The results indicated that explicit strategy instruction (explicit practice, elaboration, strategy cuing) and small group interactive settings best predicted the magnitude of treatment outcomes. Although direct instruction also positively predicted the magnitude of effect size, its effects were mitigated when an explicit strategy model was entered into the equation. The results support the robust effects of strategy training as a general heuristic for instructing students with learning disabilities.

A single-visit cervical carcinoma prevention program offered at an inner city church

A single-visit cervical carcinoma prevention program was implemented, integrating screening, diagnosis, treatment, and health education in the familiar environment of the community church. Nonpregnant women age 18 years or older, who had not received cervical carcinoma screening in the preceding year were eligible. Subjects provided information on personal demographics, health, and knowledge regarding cervical carcinoma prevention. Thereafter, cervical cytology was collected, processed, and interpreted on site. Participants attended small-group instruction on cervical carcinoma prevention. Screening results were given to each subject individually. Patients with abnormal cytology underwent immediate colposcopy with biopsies or loop electrosurgical excision procedure as indicated. Participant satisfaction and educational impact were evaluated. Ninety of the 98 participants reported that Spanish was their native language; 59 did not speak English. Fifty-four had had fewer than 6 years of education and 55 were unemployed. Seventy-eight did not have a regular physician or health insurance. Twenty-four either had never undergone cervical carcinoma screening or had let more than 5 years elapse since their previous examination. None of nine potential barriers assessed correlated with past compliance with cervical carcinoma screening. The mean time for processing and on-site interpretation of cervical cytology smears was 22.6 +/- 5.3 minutes. The median time patients spent in the program was 75 minutes. There was a significant improvement in the subjects' knowledge regarding cervical carcinoma prevention. All participants were highly satisfied. This parish-based, integrated, single-visit program for the prevention of cervical carcinoma was easily implemented and provided care to a substantial proportion of underserved patients.