Jigsaw Reading in Action

Jigsaw reading is an extremely effective activity to aid student cooperation, motivation and learning. It can be used primarily when the text may be quite challenging to understand as a whole. It is predominantly an ESL reading strategy but can be correctly implemented to other subjects. This is particularly relevant for me working in an international school where, for the majority of students, English is a second or even a third language. I discovered this strategy whilst studying for the CELTA qualification at Swansea University.

So, what is this strategy? It involves students reading a particular part of the text. This part of the text becomes their piece of the jigsaw. After reading and making notes, they will then share their findings with the other students in the class. The other student will listen, take notes and then share their findings from their part of the jigsaw. This is great for learners of all abilities and can be used as a group task or individual task depending on the number of students. Mengduo & Xiaoling (2010) report that the jigsaw technique is an effective way to promote student participation and enthusiasm as well as a useful method for language learners to accomplish learning tasks in the EFL classroom.


Implementing Jigsaw Reading Into Psychology

Today, students were looking at one of the many contemporary studies that they are required to learn for their Edexcel IAL Psychology examination. The study was conducted by Haun et al. (2014). It is quite a difficult text to understand, but jigsaw reading makes the students work as a team to understand the whole text. The main areas students should look at when understanding a study are:
Aims
Procedure
Results
Conclusion
Evaluation & Future Recommendations.

This worked great for me because I had precisely five students in my year 12 Psychology class. I gave the students 10 minutes to read over their part and make notes. Then they had to find another student to share each other's findings. This carried on until each student had visited every area that was required to be covered.
Eventually, students had a full set of notes on the study, and I asked them to read carefully over the notes, check if the information is correct, and whether they need to add or remove any other information. The full set of notes becomes the completed 'jigsaw puzzle'.
The students then report back to the teacher their findings. The teacher's role is to consolidate this information and see if there are any 'gaps' in their jigsaw.

Overall, I feel that this strategy is extremely effective for students of all abilities when reading a fairly long or complicated piece of text. It fosters peer collaboration and communication in the classroom and makes a challenging idea/topic seem less daunting.


* References provided through hyperlinks to the original document
** Links to my student's blogs are provided below

http://tashapsycheblog.blogspot.com/

http://yasminepsychologyial.blogspot.com/

https://natnichanickypsychologyial.blogspot.com/

https://isabellepsychologyial.blogspot.com/
https://veerphad.blogspot.com/

Thank you for reading.