End of Trimester Survey After working with my students on Cooperative Learning strategies and community building activities for

six months I gave my baseline survey a second time. I was pleased with the results and feel that they reflect how my students had grown as communicators and collaborators. In the first survey half of my

students didnt feel like they could learn something from their classmates and by the end of my research only four students felt they couldnt learn something from a friend. I am hopeful that all of our partner work and class meetings to discuss working with a friend influenced their decision. Im sure that part of the reason they felt they could learn something from a friend is that they felt more comfortable in our classroom community to express themselves and share ideas. Another dramatic shift was whether or not students enjoyed reading a book with a friend. At the beginning of the school year they were split 50/50, however by February all but four students stated they enjoyed reading with a friend, at least sometimes. This was something that I enjoyed seeing blossom over the year. Initially, pairs of students would sit next to each other to read, but interact very little, much like in parallel play. As time passed, I noticed students trying to read chorally and pointing out pictures they liked in the text. These were all things we had practiced in our Reading groups and it was great to see them put it to practice! Students questioning skills definitely improved over time as well. There are many factors that influenced this. For NES transitioning from the silent stage to producing and understanding more Spanish had a lot to do with how often they asked questions or expressed their wonderings. I continued to push students to use more Spanish. NES rose to the occasion and the majority would

try out questions, knowing that I would support them with the language. As for the NSS, they continued to ask questions and contribute to our class meetings. One dilemma that I am still struggling with is the amount of background knowledge and outside experiences that each group of students comes with. Typically, it the NES would have more connections and comments to make about new topics of study. For example, when we were studying about weather, many of my NES would tell stories about far off places they had visited that had different weather, whereas the majority of the NSS did not share similar experiences. I was pleasantly surprised that all of my students felt like they were good listeners for the final survey. I am certain that my daily mantra of, Escucho con atencion. I listen attentively had everything to do with this. Seriously, our daily conversations about working with friends in a positive way, being kind and helpful surely helped them listen more attentively. What I enjoyed most was having a student come up to me unprovoked and tell me that someone had filled their bucket by helping them out or saying a kind word.

25 20 15 10 5 0 Do you learn Do you think Do you ask Do you like Do you like from your you are a good questions talking with a sharing books classmates? listener? when you are friend in class? with friends in wondering class? something?
Figure 9. Final Survey Results

Yes No Sometimes