Dear Noam, I usually have some lag time between the individual and team RAT. For this reason, I hand out articles for students to read with the RAT that relates to the 4 S learning activity they will do later in the class (same problem, significant problem, simultaneous reporting...). As for teams finishing first, I often have the scheduled class break right after the RAT (which includes appeals). If a team finishes early, they can start their break. A team finishing early is the exception rather than the rule. The tests are hard enough that teams rarely finish early though I have seen it with high performing teams. All the best, Yvonne Yvonne D. Harrison, PhD Assistant Professor, Public Administration and Policy Rockefeller College, University at Albany, SUNY Milne 111, 135 Western Avenue Albany, NY, 12222 Office Phone: 518-442-4001 [log in to unmask] ________________________________ From: Team-Based Learning [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of Sarah Leupen [[log in to unmask]] Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2012 7:51 AM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: TEAMLEARNING-L Digest - 28 Aug 2012 to 29 Aug 2012 (#2012-126) Hi Noam, This is a common issue. Many of us use "sponge activities" to sponge up the extra time while the other teams finish the tRAT. I teach anatomy, so I have the teams start anatomy labeling games online or on worksheets during this time, and then we move on to the applications when everyone is done. It's also a good time to check in with teams (the ones that are done) and get to know the individuals in them a bit better. It's also possible to move the appeals process outside of class time, if that ends up being the part that takes up a lot of time. Sarah Leupen On Thu, Aug 30, 2012 at 3:00 AM, TEAMLEARNING-L automatic digest system <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote: There is 1 message totalling 30 lines in this issue. Topics of the day: 1. idle time during RAPs ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 29 Aug 2012 14:45:06 -0700 From: Noam Perry <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> Subject: idle time during RAPs This semester is my first attempt at TBL, and I just had my first RAP with my class, Human Rights and Justice. It went great, and I am looking forward to see how this semester progresses. One thing that I noticed was that some teams were a lot faster than the other. The fastest team completed the tRAT first, and had nothing to appeal because they got everything right (it was very easy). The slowest team took the longest time taking the tRAT, and then had a lot it could potentially appeal. So the fastest teams had some 15 minutes of waiting time while other teams were doing appeals. Since it was the first RAP I encouraged them to use this time to get to know each other better, but I was wondering if anyone has something productive the fastest teams can do in this time. Thanks, Noam ---------------------------------------------- Noam Perry Lecturer Department of Justice Studies San Jose State University One Washington Square San Jose, CA 95192 ------------------------------ End of TEAMLEARNING-L Digest - 28 Aug 2012 to 29 Aug 2012 (#2012-126) *********************************************************************