Math Groups?

I haven't made a post in a while.  The main reason being that the use of math groups in my classroom has come to a stand still.  There are many reasons for this, which I will explain in detail with this post.  This post will most likely get lengthy, for there is a lot going on in the classroom.  The coming notes are may thoughts and observations...

Two weeks ago, my students and I began our "Fractions101"unit.  Prior to the start of this lengthy unit, my teaching team had decided we should complete this unit by winter break.  That gave us 14 days to teach 12 lessons and give the unit assessment.  I felt confident with that timeline.
One the first day of the unit, I gave a pre-assessment.  When I looked over the completed assessments, I was very surprised by the results.  Here was the breakdown:
Of the 29 students:
6 - strong knowledge of fractions
9 - basic knowledge of fractions
14 - little to no prior knowledge of fractions
I immediately formed six groups of students, and began thinking of how our groups would work for this unit.  Because so many students did not have prior knowledge of fractions, I knew that I needed to see as many groups per day as possible.  Because I had six groups smaller groups, I bundled them together, to also form three larger groups.  For the first three lessons, we had 15 minutes of warm-up, 20 minutes of mini-lesson, and two 20 minute groups.  I was able to see two groups.  The students that were not with me, were at math workshop working on math journal pages or doing fraction problems with whiteboards and beans.  (This activity was very good, and kept the students engaged.)  Overall the environment these two days was very hectic.  I felt very rushed during the mini-lesson.  Because most of the students did not have a lot of prior knowledge, I had to spend more time going over the basics.  By the time the students went to math workshop, many did not have the skill base to work productively.  Even with many reminders of DESCA, and the proper way to work in math workshop, the time was not productive.  The students filled out a DESCA self-evaluation after math time this week, and they too felt the overall performance during math workshop did not meet our expectations.  Also, after reviewing some formative assessments from those lessons, I realized that a change needed to be made, for the students were not making great progress or showing mastery of the I Can statements.

So...here is how things have been operating the last week.
I have a group of six students that work in the hallway during the 70 minutes of math time.  They are my 'high-flyers' who all have a very strong knowledge base.  Because the already knew most of the material we were working on, they were being a behavior issue during math workshop.  So now, they are completing the unit at their own pace (which is very quickly).   They work collaboratively and help one another through difficult problems.  It is great to see how focused and driven they are, knowing that I am trusting them to be productive and learn/teach with one another.  Once they finish the unit, which will be before the rest of the class, I have some advanced fraction work for them to do.  I meet with them during silent reading time, and review/mini-lesson the material.  This takes roughly 10 minutes.

Because they are not in the room, having six less bodies to focus on helps me.  We still have our 15 minutes of warm-up, but mini-lesson has been greatly extended.  We now have a whole group lesson for roughly 40 minutes.  I feel that this is making a large difference in the productivity of the students for the remaining 20-25 minutes of math.  During this time, the students are working on math workshop activities...mainly math journal pages.  I am pulling students as I see needed, based on observations from mini-lesson.  Sometimes this has been one-on-one, groups of three, or up to five students.  I generally work with this group for the 15 minutes, and spend the remaining 10 minutes circulating around the room assisting students individually.

I miss having the rotations of math groups, for I feel like I knew all of my students better from the perspective of math.  I got to see them work more often, and have small group conversations with them.
However, the content of this unit, the lack of prior knowledge, and the constraint of finishing the unit before winter break are not allowing this to happen.  I feel like the current set up is the best option, for there is still a little time for small group work.  The students complete another DESCA self-evaluation at the end of this week, and the results were more positive for the productivity of math workshop time, and the overall feel of the environment.  I am interested to see how the students will perform on the unit assessment and their mastery of the I Can statements.