Team Based Collaborative Learning
All students in Brain Hurricane’s programs work in small
groups to arrive at a common solution to a divergent activity.
Divergent means that the activity has more than one correct
solution, as do most problems in the real world.
Because there is more than one correct solution to a problem, there
is also more than one way to solve a problem. Students in all of
Brain Hurricane’s programs learn how to efficiently and effectively
arrive at a solution to a problem. In arriving at this solution,
they also learn valuable personal and teamwork skills that will
benefit them throughout their lives, personally and professionally.
Unlike lecture settings—where students often drift off—students
in Brain Hurricane’s programs are active members of a small
group. Instead of sitting and listening they are standing and talking.
They are active members of the group, and they must share ideas
to help their team.
Teams are further encouraged to perform their best work so that
they will compete against other teams. Competition gives meaning
to their effort. Students rise to the challenge because they have
fun, and because their ideas matter.
Learn more about our
Cooperative
learning strategies
Research
supporting the program
The Education Kit™ program employs cooperative strategies
whereby students become responsible for their actions and learn
to contribute to team solutions. These cooperative strategies engage
students in the learning process and encourage them to construct
meaning and retain concepts with greater success.
Below you will find research attesting to the success of cooperative
learning strategies.
I began my teaching career 32 years ago in a small, poor school
district in Bloomingdale, Michigan. Like many young teachers I was
idealistic, and filled with an energy that I was sure could change
the world—or at least a few of my students. I had a student
in my class that first year that was very intelligent, but was always
mentally drifting someplace far away from that rural schoolhouse.
One day while I was walking around the class, I noticed this student
had drawn an elaborate pencil sketch of what appeared to be a graveyard.
Upon closer examination I could read the epitaph on one of the gravestones:
“In memory of all those who died waiting for the bell.”
Those words shook me to my core. I didn’t want my students
to die waiting for the bell. I wanted them to love learning. My
youthful idealism quickly gave way to focused pragmatism. How could
I make my students want to learn? How could I make learning interesting?
Since those formative years I have done everything within my power
to find engaging methods to teach. Research and my own personal
observations have made it clear that students only learn when they
are paying attention. And the best way to make students pay attention
is to make learning fun. The Education Kits™ program is designed
to do just that: to make learning fun.
With the assistance of fellow educators and colleagues, my staff
and I have created a program that is designed to engage students
in exciting hands-on lessons. The hands-on lessons coincide with
specific curriculum content that is designed to help students achieve
state and national education standards.
The Kits were created with both the teacher and student in
mind.
Students love the Kits because they love completing the exercises.
Teachers love the Kits because each individual exercise provides
the teacher with planning material and specifically indicates which
content standard an exercise is designed to help achieve. Also,
everything a teacher needs to complete each exercise is contained
within the Kit, meaning that there is virtually no preparation time
needed.
In creating the Education Kits™ program, my hope is to help
bring fun and engaging learning strategies to all students. It is
also my hope that by alleviating preparation time and effort, teachers
will be more likely to utilize hands-on learning in their classroom.
The Education Kits™ program will keep students in your school
from dying while waiting for the bell, and instill them with a love
for learning that will benefit them throughout their lives.
