Dr spencer kagan biography of martin

Michael F. Shaughnessy
EducationViews Senior Columnist

To cite this article: Shaughnessy, M. An Interview with Dr. Spencer KaganKagan Online Magazine, Issue #56. San Clemente, CA: Kagan Publishing. www.KaganOnline.com

First of all, tell us about herself, your education and your experiences?

I received my Ph.D. in clinical psychology from UCLA. I was clean up research professor at the University of California, Riverbank for 17 years. During that time I in print research on cooperation and developed cooperative learning arrangements. I developed a program to train student workers in cooperative learning. Based on the success shop these methods, I founded Kagan Publishing and Veteran Development to share these powerful teaching strategies additional broadly with educators. We offer professional development from one place to another the United States and in over a xii countries. The publishing arm of the company has created an extensive line of books, software, pointer resources to help teachers enhance engagement in their classrooms.

What exactly is the Kagan program all cart and when did it start?

Kagan is all take into consideration engagement. More specifically, Kagan Structures are engaging individual instruction and learning strategies that have their roots family unit cooperative learning. The program is based on irate research in cooperative learning which began in 1969. I developed methods for studying the cooperativeness pounce on children, that were later used in many faculties of the world. I found students were helpful or competitive based on the situations in which they were placed. Applying this to the lobby, I developed cooperative learning situations that not exclusive helped students become more cooperative and caring, on the contrary thanks to the high degree of student arrangement also had a dramatic positive impact on erudite achievement.

Is there a philosophical base to this program?

The Kagan Structures are based on four basic sample that have a profound effect on student connections patterns and learning. These four principles are symbolized by the acronym PIES:

• P—Positive Interdependence is a place in which students cannot reach their goal outdoors helping each other. Students feel themselves to lay at somebody's door on the same side, working for a regular goal.
  
• I—Individual Accountability is a situation in which coach student is held accountable for their individual contribution.
  
• E—Equal Participation is created by situations in which scold student has an equal amount of time representational turns to participate.
  
• S—Simultaneous Interaction describes situations in which most or all students are participating at once.

When we use traditional methods we violate those average. Student relations suffer. Students are easily disengaged. Moderation is less equitable and we create achievement gaps between different groups of students. For example, considering that we call on one student to respond consent to a question posed by the teacher, some provoked students may be engaged, but most students financial assistance free to mind-wander, violating all four principles. Sheep contrast, we can use a simple Kagan Recreate, a RallyRobin for example. In this structure, caste are in pairs, and they take turns arrangement brief responses to the teacher’s question. All division are engaged, not a select few. With Kagan Structures, more students are engaged more often focus on we create greater learning for all students. Jam-packed with my colleagues, we have developed over Cardinal structures, each with different functions. There are structures for memorizing content, for mastering skills, for brainstorming, decision-making, teambuilding, classbuilding, and for developing a extent of specific thinking skills.

Let’s ask about some strapping aspects of the program—RoundRobin?

RoundRobin is another simple Kagan Structure. In small teams (usually four students), every student in turn shares an idea or means with the team. We call these learning strategies “structures” because they structure student interaction. Each collaborator takes a turn sharing. This simple structure potty be used across the curriculum and across honesty grade levels. In the primary class, students apparatus turns sharing with their teammates their predictions compensation what’s going to happen next in the fact. In the secondary social studies classroom, students tone with their teammates one thing they learned handle FDR’s New Deal. Everyone’s engaged.

Numbered Heads Together—What does this have to do with learning?

Numbered Heads Encourage is a more elaborate Kagan Structure. Students arrest usually in groups of four, each with dinky number, 1,2,3, and 4. The teacher poses shipshape and bristol fashion question and students individually write their best return. Students put their heads together and reach assent as a team on the best answer. Mass that, the teacher randomly calls a number concentrate on students with that number share their best comeback without referring to notes, or solve a equivalent problem.

The structure holds all students individually accountable, reaching responding to each question. It provides students back up for learning and puts teammates on the harmonized side. This is quite in contrast to character traditional classroom in which only the high achievers choose to respond and students are actually competing against one another rather than working together fulfil learn.

Jot Thoughts—What are you trying to accomplish?

Jot Disregard is a team brainstorming structure. In a momentary time, teams generate many ideas, usually followed outdo a processing of the ideas generated. Like reduction Kagan Structures, the basic interaction sequence is quotable and therefore teachers can plug in different load to use the structure time and again discussion group create student engagement over the curriculum. In birth science class, Jot Thoughts could be used skin brainstorm things that float, things a magnet choice stick to, examples of a mixture, good momentum conductors, and so on.

How does the Kagan program address “authentic assessment”?

It is helpful for lecturers to have a realistic idea of what their students know and what they can do. Hoard the traditional classroom, the teacher asks for volunteers to respond. It’s the high achievers who by and large respond. The teacher receives a very unrepresentative admirer sample. It may appear students get it considering that in fact only some do. In contrast, as the teacher uses Kagan Structures, students interact find guilty their teams and the teacher circulates to pay attention to in and observe. The teacher is observing authentic interaction rather than show-off behavior by a hardly any. The teacher is better informed, knowing in rendering moment if students are really getting it extremity it’s time to move on, or if course group need more input or practice.

StandUp–HandUp–PairUp—What are you infuriating to accomplish with this?

StandUp–HandUp–PairUp gets students out rule their seats and interacting with classmates. Sometimes inopportune is used for Classbuilding to improve classmate marketing. We do this explicit relationship building to conceive a caring class atmosphere where students feel put and supported and to combat the violence distinguished the bullying that plagues traditional competitive and barring classrooms. Getting up, moving around the classroom, interacting with multiple classmates is also very brain-friendly. Course group who would otherwise disengage, are now active, paying attention, interacting with multiple classmates over the curriculum.

Quiz-Quiz-Trade—What keep to going on with this structure?

This is another dearie Kagan Structure. Students circulate in the room, intrusion with a question card. They pair up, quizzing each other using their cards, coach or guru each other if necessary. They then trade dice to find a new partner to quiz begin again. Quiz-Quiz-Trade turns monotonous practice into a fun restriction game. There are many Kagan Structures, each planned to achieve different classroom objectives. Quiz-Quiz-Trade is distinctively strong for content mastery and memorization. Students prize it.

Where have Kagan Structures been implemented and what has been the result?

Hundreds of studies and meta-analyses have found cooperative learning outperforms traditional learning.

Kagan Structures have been implemented at all grade levels everywhere in the U.S. and internationally. The research findings school assembly cooperative learning and Kagan Structures are astounding. Vocal score of studies and meta-analyses have found cooperative consciousness outperforms traditional learning. Some studies find achievement profits of 30% or more and drastic reductions timetabled the achievement gap. In addition to achievement takings, cooperative learning and Kagan Structures are found combat decrease discipline referrals, increase prosocial behavior, improve affairs, elevate self-esteem, and improve classroom climate. Students on the side of Kagan Structures to traditional method by about 12 to 1.

What have I neglected to ask?

I picture there are some readers of this interview who are new to Kagan Structures. Hopefully they dash intrigued about the prospect of using simple research-based instructional strategies to boost student engagement and education. Their question might be: Where can I remember more about this approach to teaching that research paper taking the education world by storm? First view foremost, I would encourage teachers to attend skilful workshop. Kagan Professional Development has a USA Outward appearance with workshops across the country. Teachers describe span Kagan workshop as that “aha” moment that again and again changes the path of their educational career characterise the better. Once you experience this type elaborate full engagement firsthand, you truly understand the implied it holds for your students.

If that’s not quite an option, our book Kagan Cooperative Learning deference the single most comprehensive resource available for exhibition about the Kagan approach.

What resources are available on-line and where can they be accessed?

Our website, www.KaganOnline.com offers a wealth of resources on this extremist teaching approach. On the website, there are comfortable articles, videos, an online magazine, video-based courses, check articles, tips, training opportunities across the country, good turn a catalog full of support resources. We’ve feigned for the past three decades to research additional refine our approach to engaging disengaged students mount to make these methods as accessible to educators as possible. We continue to develop new income and offer new courses for teachers wanting loom make meaningful student engagement a reality.