Multitasking Classrooms
This article introduces exemplary multitasking instructional frame methods that prepare you and your students for simultaneous activities to occur during the same time period. Multitasking classrooms release teachers to teach and students to participate in a variety of high-quality activities. At the beginning of the school year it is best to start with monotasking with the whole group. When students develop established routinse and understand the ground rules for large group activities, it is appropriate to teach them about a simultaneous second activity.
Different student activities can now be conducted during the same timeframe. When the teacher makes this adjustment, activities shift from monotasking to multitasking. Simultaneous activities within a class period are an enormous advantage for teaching. When the teacher and students work on different activities at the same time, the teacher shares responsibility for the classroom community with the students. Students who work independently allow the teacher to work with small groups in targeted lessons and instruction to be differentiated .
Implementation
- Introduce students to simultaneous sessions, one teaching activity and the other an independent activity.
- Carefully brief your students, explaining the division of the class into groups.
- Stock activities for Multitasking.
- The number of tasks and activities that teachers need to develop for students to perform depends on how many sessions of the instructional frame are to be completed on a particular day.
- For every activity in a session there shouldbe a task for students to perform.
From: http://www.education.com/reference/article/multitasking-classrooms/ 
Classroom Management
To introduce students to an instructional frame with simultaneous sessions, the teacher carefully briefs the students, explaining that the simultaneous teaching and follow-up activities will require the class to be divided into two groups. See Table 3.7 - http://www.education.com/reference/article/multitasking-classrooms/ 
The topic of community building is introduced and the follow-up activity extends the teaching focus to journaling. Students who are in the group that completes the follow-up activity first, before the teaching activity, describes their prior knowledge as discussed during the briefing. The simplest way to divide the class is to have half of the students journal while the other half (on the left side) meets with the teacher on the topic of community building.
Depending on the students' experience in independent activities and on school schedules, the teacher may choose to pause the frame after the first simultaneous session (session two) to debrief. The teacher then resumes the frame or does so at the next meeting of the class, briefing the students again to re-orient them to the frame before proceeding with session three. The teacher uses a kitchen timer or other time reminders, to ensure that the sessions remain on schedule. In the multitasking frame, students must learn to respect the teacher's time with other students.
To emphasize the importance of the teacher's time with other students, it is recommended that teachers ignore students who approach or address them with questions during the teaching session. Simi;larly, teachers should not intervene in students' independent activity except in cases of an emergency. Because the expectations for the activity have been reviewed during the briefing along with the classroom community agreement, students are aware of what they are expected to do. Debriefing occurs again after both the teaching activity and the follow-up session are completed. The students discuss their success in their independent work and the quality of the task they have completed.
