Practical example

Better marbles than silence - marble groups

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Eckhard Giese
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Although students have usually known each other for some time and attend courses in familiar groups, there are often no answers to spontaneous questions posed by the lecturer to the plenum. Too great is the fear of embarrassment, the apprehension of expressing one's own opinion or the fear of one's own voice in the room. In addition, students quickly become accustomed to the exclusive consumption of information and therefore take on a rather passive role. These unfavourable conditions for a dialogue between teacher and students can be countered with mumble groups.

For marble groups, students are asked to team up with one or two neighbours from the plenary to answer one or two questions. These can either be technical questions or questions whose answers provide feedback on the current status of the students.

Another variation is to discuss controversial questions in groups of marble groups (e.g. one question for half a plenary), so that a discussion of answers and/or points of view can then take place in plenary.

Hier finden Sie weitere Informationen: Marble groups - promoting interaction (Train the Trainer)

The challenge of teaching

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Prerequisites for implementation

Die Methode eignet sich besonders für mittlere bis sehr große Gruppen (Empfehlung: ab 12 Studierende) in beinahe allen denkbaren Lehrkontexten.

Procedure

Ein entscheidender Vorteil der Murmelgruppe liegt in der Vorarbeit der Gruppe: Die Studierenden haben bereits gesprochen, bevor sie bei Bedarf ins Plenum sprechen. Die Aufforderung zum Reden kommt also nicht abrupt. Werden einzelne Studierende zu einem Redebeitrag aufgefordert, dann äußern sie nicht ihre Meinung sondern die der Gruppe und finden darin Schutz, sollte die Antwort kritisch diskutiert werden.

Typische Fragen für Murmelgruppen sind neben den fachlichen Fragen folgende Varianten:

  • What were my main insights from the discussion?
  • Was muß ich noch wissen?
  • What did I not understand?
  • Wie lässt sich das Besprochene in die Praxis überführen?

Eine Murmelgruppe-Runde sollte nicht länger als 5 bis 10 Minuten dauern. Danach können einzelne Gruppe ihre Antworten / ihre Ergebnisse vorstellen.

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Leitfragen, die während der Murmel-Phase gut sichtbar sein sollten (Handreichung, Folie oder Präsentation)

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Jan Monday

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