Peer Coaching with 1st grade

What am I made of? What’s good for me?

 Mrs. Paula Vorne, 1st grade teacher

Children are always interested in studying the human body. This time our 1^st and 5^th grade students were even more excited because they did some of the studying together. Peer coaching is a powerful tool and we used it so that the 1^st graders good get better learning results on the subject. First step was that the 1 st graders were divided into groups and the groups were given five subjects: body parts, rest, nutrition, exercise and hygiene and their job was to come up with key words under every subject. Key words were used then to form questions with the godstudents from 5^th grade. 5^th graders had already practiced question making in their own class and their job was to guide the 1^st grader to find and form the right kind of questions.

Next time when the students met the questions were shared to all of them and they had to answer them with a whole sentence. Godstudents role was then to help the 1^st graders form and write right kind of sentences because some of the 1^st graders have only recently learned how to read and their writing skills are in early stages. Last step of this project was that the older students helped the 1^st graders to change the sentences of their choice so that they were all in “me”-form. Teacher took a photo of every student and the printed photos were used so that every student made a poster of themselves. 

Working with the godstudents was very important for the 1^st graders and they were always anxiously waiting for the next time. 5^th graders carried their responsibilities really good and I could see from their expression that they felt themselves really important as they were supposed to.