Ability Grouping--Kelli Donald

After reading an article and the chapter about ability grouping pulling from my previous experience, I have to say I have mixed feelings about the topic.  As with just about all ideas in education, there seem to be definite advantages and disadvantages for gifted and talented students in reference to ability grouping.  Throughout my teaching career, I have heard the term cooperative learning/ability grouping frequently and have always assumed it is a great teaching practice for all students.  And it has worked very well for me many times.  But after just a few short weeks into my study of G/T students I see that grouping students to work based on academic ability isn't always such a good thing.


What I do like about ability grouping is being able to differentiate instruction with small groups.  By having the high, medium, and fragile students in their own groups, I am able to meet more individual needs with specific instruction.  The students are also more comfortable and less intimidated when working with students along their same ability level.  It also gives the G/T students opportunities to explore their creativity and bounce ideas off of others students who are more like them.  I also like ability grouping for G/T because they don't always get stuck doing all the work for the group.  The responsibilities are more balanced. 


Some disadvantages to ability grouping include for one assigning an ability level to students.  Sometimes I am guilty of considering a student in my "low" group a low student in all areas.  Which is unfair and not necessarily true.  And vice versa the students in my higher groups sometimes may get the short end of my instruction if I seem to be running low on time in groups.  I just assume they will be able to figure out how to do some of the things on their own.  Students also pick up on their ability groups and begin to self-identify as high or low.  This doesn't happen as often with heterogeneous groups.  Sometimes the lower/medium students are motivated to work harder if they are in groups with some of the top students. 


Overall, I am a huge fan of cooperative learning.  I am on the fence about ability grouping, however.  For me and my classroom there are times when ability grouping works well, such as math small groups.  It seems to be better for me to heterogeneously groups students in Social Studies and Science activities so my students are mixed together to learn how to work with all types of people.  The latter scenario is, in my opinion, more like what students will experience in the real world.  The workforce is a melting pot of people of all abilities so learning how to cooperatively work with everyone is very beneficial.