Why Cooperative Learning?

As a first step to introduce you to this blog, I will briefly describe the most relevant aspects of Cooperative Learning. As you should know, this approach has been widely explored in order to redirect teaching practices based on individualistic learning, in which educators’ role was the center of the learning process. By implementing CL, I expect to give students more autonomy and responsibility towards their actions and their learning process. In addition, I aim to foster students’ oral interaction and to defuse some challenging behaviors that I have observed in previous opportunities.

Cohen, Brody and Shevin (2004), assert that complete individualization is not a practical solution to work on all students’ needs in a particular classroom. One of the main advantages of CL is that it allows students to work together and carry out the role of teacher and of learner, recognizing and respecting each other’s skills and learning styles. In this proposal, students are working together to achieve particular goals that are proposed at the beginning of the lessons, they are also following different roles based on their specific skills and preferences. By doing this, students might acknowledge and respect each other’s differences, weaknesses and strengths.

Furthermore, Johnson, Johnson, and Holubec (1999), affirm that the exceptional performance in the classroom depends on the cooperative efforts of a group and not on the individualistic and competitive attitude of some learners. Students must actively participate in their learning process, and the success of this participation is closely related to teamwork and cooperative learning. These ideas certainly contrast with the traditional competitive classroom, in which students are usually working individually, intending to reach academic objectives. For achieving a CL environment with my students I am adopting the five key elements of cooperative learning that I will be explaining in my next entry.

In the following video you may find strategies and examples of Cooperative Learning.

References:

Cohen, E., Brody, C., Shevin, M. (2004) Teaching Cooperative Learning: The challenge for Teacher Education. State University of New York Press.

Johnson, D., Johnson R. & Holubec, E. (1994) Cooperative Learning in the Classroom. Virginia: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

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