Collaborative Teaching : One Awesome, Engaging, Royal Mess

“Take this card from English and bring it to World Geography. Write all of the things that overlap. Topics researched in English that you talk about in Geography. Then take the card to Math and do the same thing. Same thing with Science. Then to Band, choir, art, tech ed, and FACs. Every day you will have a card filled with topics and themes that cover all of the content areas. Use these to cement facts and ideas in your mind. File them in your ‘Cross Curricular Receptacle’ in your locker.”


Imagining an education system which would work like this makes me insanely excited. There is nothing more advantageous than to link relevancy to material in class. Students are much more likely to recall information and apply difficult themes when they have received it in several different places and possibly different methods. This type of instruction is referred to as Cross Curricular Teaching or Collaboration or Interdisciplinary teaching. But they all basically mean the same thing. Students are taught, sometimes with several teachers, material which spans the different curricular areas.


My own experience with this type of instruction was complicated! I agree and advocate for collaboration with teachers and content. I believe this is the best way to link relevancy to material which doesn’t directly apply to their lives outside of school. Plus, I believe it denotes the nature of education being that it is not to be segregated but built upon. I teach a concept in English that my fellow science teacher also teaches (even something simple as research and I use the Big 6 Research method) and it would be great if we used the same method, same terms. Students latch on to this because they are already comfortable with or at least familiar with this method. But it can be so hard to do this in a small school where the system isn’t set up to directly easily accommodate this type of teaching.


When I student taught in Fargo, I was lucky enough to be in a middle school where it was set up in teams. Cross curricular occurred all the time! We had team meetings daily where we would discuss how we were approaching certain topics and it became easy to say, “I want to teach research methods in my classroom, what do you guys use in your classes so I can teach something they will be familiar with or use later?” Plus we all taught seventh grade so if we wanted to team teach a class it was as easy as saying, “Okay Math and English together today in the team center.” This system was smooth and forward thinking.


However, when I accepted a job I went to a small rural school where I taught seventh grade English this was not the system. Though the positives of teaching in a small school are many, there are also many challenges. One of these was the difficulty in setting up collaboration with other teachers. I did make this happen as often as I could. However the first time, it is almost comical how difficult it was to make it happen. The first step was to search out a teacher who would be willing to do this with me, no matter what. I found one in an 11th grade social studies teacher. Odd combo to say the least but we planned and planned until we came up with an interdisciplinary unit which we felt would be a positive experience for students. With this arrangement I felt our students also benefited from learning to work with students of a different age and especially with my seventh graders this would be an opportunity for personal growth. So then we went and presented it to the principal. He was accepting and positive about it. He said “figure out how you are going to do it and let me know what you need me to do.” That was the tough part! We taught several periods in which the other did not have students. We had to adjust our lessons for the classes which would not be paired (one only 7th grade lesson and one only 11th grade lesson). And then we had to reschedule our days (my eating lunch at a different time as well as my students from one period). We had to teach through our own preps and keep all of this straight for our students. In general we made a royal mess out of the schedule. But it was worth it. Seeing the students working together and on their group projects which included research, presentation and a creative writing piece was amazing. Students requested this activity again and again through the year.

I was lucky to find a teacher who was as dedicated to this project as I was because there were many times where it would have been easier just to drop it. But the rewards of cross curricular teaching are immense and we need to strive to include in our curriculum this as much as possible.