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What Does Co-Teaching Look Like?
There are five different models for co-teaching, and we employ variations on all of them. We know from 40 years of practice that teaming up to teach is not only more enjoyable for teachers, but it challenges them to build trust and share differing perspectives, which only helps students have a richer experience. Further, as we move toward addressing students’ individual needs, having more than one professional accessible to work with allows students to really be seen, help them when they get stuck, and move forward with them if they are accelerating.
Lead and Support
One teacher leads and another offers assistance and support to individuals or small groups. In this role, planning must occur by both teachers, but typically one teacher plans for the lesson content, while the other teacher does specific planning for students’ individual learning or behavioral needs.
Small Group
Students are divided into similar ability or interest groups and work at classroom stations with each teacher. Later in the day, student groups switch to the other station. Teachers divide instructional content into several segments and present the content in separate stations around the room. To have smaller groups, we split the class into three groups with the third group working independently
Parallel
Teachers jointly plan instruction, but each may deliver it to half the class or small groups. This type of model typically requires joint planning time to ensure that as teachers work in their separate groups, they are delivering content in the same way.
Alternative
One teacher works with a small group of students to pre-teach, re-teach, supplement, or enrich instruction, while the other teacher instructs the large group. In this type of co-teaching, more planning time is needed to ensure that the logistics of pre-teaching or re-teaching can be completed.
Team
Both teachers share the planning and instruction of students in a coordinated fashion. In this type of joint planning time, equal knowledge of the content, a shared philosophy, and commitment to all students in the class are critical. This is our favored method as teams develop planning and trust.