During large-group math lectures, teachers can help students to retain more instructional content by incorporating brief Peer Guided Pause sessions into lectures.
Type: Core Instruction
Procedures:
(1) Students are trained to work in pairs. At one or more appropriate review points in a lecture period, the instructor directs students to pair up to work together for 4 minutes.
(2) During each Peer Guided Pause, students are given a worksheet that contains one or more correctly completed word or number problems illustrating the math concept(s) currently being reviewed in the lecture. The sheet also contains several additional, similar problems that pairs of students must work cooperatively to complete, along with an answer key.
(3) Student pairs are reminded to (a) monitor their understanding of the lesson concepts; (b) review the correctly math model problem; (c) work cooperatively on the additional problems, and (d) check their answers.
(4) The teacher can direct student pairs to write their names on the practice sheets and collect the work as a convenient way to monitor student participation and understanding.
Source:
Research Citations: Hawkins, J., & Brady, M. P. (1994). The effects of independent and peer guided practice during instructional pauses on the academic performance of students with mild handicaps. Education & Treatment of Children, 17 (1), 1-28.