Idea

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Idea
By Jools

Glad you are feeling better. My first 4 years were teaching in a class where ability ranged from first grade to fourth (it was a 3rd grade class)plus special needs. I almost died trying to help everyone until I realized I
was not tapping some wonderful classroom potential. My advanced students could be taught to teach. I started by just saying "Sally could you help Jonny with that worksheet." If Sally seemed to like it we advanced slowly to the point she was making very simple lesson plans that taught a subject she had mastery of. This fits into your lesson plans under "Group A will create a lesson on fractions

and demonstrate it to a group of 3 fellow students." Creating lessons and teaching them comes under higher level thinking skills and often the students in charge learns something new too. However make sure everyone gets a chance to "teach". ESL(English as a second language) can teach something about their culture( fit it in with a book). This is tricky but the pay offs are great. Low students get a self esteem boost and some of your "know it all "students realize they still have a lot to learn. It takes a bit of management at first but soon it actually lightens your load. Hope this helps.
If things are really bad maybe it time for a school change. Good luck.