SMALL GROUPS

"Because student's vary greatly in readiness at any given point in an instructional cycle, it is critical during a unit to find a way to teach to a learner's needs rather than only to an imaginary whole-class readiness."

Teaching in small groups is a very effective strategy.  Teaching in small groups allows you to teach at student's readiness levels, interest, and learning profiles.  The key to working with small groups, is that you shouldn't have groups set in stone where the same people work with the same people overtime.  Teachers should be actively looking for students to work with in small groups.  For example, if you are starting to write a story, and a group of students are really having trouble coming up with what to write about, you could quickly give the gesture of saying, "I see there are some students struggling to come up with what to write.  If you are having trouble and think you could use some help coming up with some ideas, meet me up at the whiteboard, and we will go over some possible topics."  These students will work together for maybe 3-5 minutes, and then that exact same group of students will probably never work together again.  That need of coming up with a topic to write about was solved in less than 5 minutes, and you have those students back to their seat writing rather than them goofing off, and procrastinating about a topic.  

You can use Small Group Instruction for any Subject!