In-Class Ideas

Cooperative Learning

Class at Champlain engaged in cooperative group work

What Exactly is Cooperative Learning?

Cooperative Learning is part of a group of teaching/learning technique where students interact with each other to acquire and practice the elements of a subject matter and to meet common learning goals. It is much more than just putting students into groups and hoping for the best.

Cooperative Learning is a very formal way of structuring activities in a learning environment that includes specific elements intended to increase the potential for rich and deep learning by the participants. The consistent use of these principles in an organized way is at the heart of Cooperative Learning.

Cooperative Learning models include the following basic principles:

  • Group tasks are designed to be suitable for group work.
  • Positive interdependence is built in – cooperation is necessary for students to succeed.
  • Attention and class time are given to interpersonal/cooperative skill building.
  • Participants learn together in small (2-5 member) groups.
  • Students are individually accountable for learning and participation.
  • The instructor’s role changes from being the “sage on the stage” to the “guide on the side.”
  • Cooperative Learning is about moving from rote learning to learning how to think critically and in changing circumstances.

David W. Johnson, Roger T. Johnson, Edythe, J. Holubec and others identify five basic elements of cooperative learning. These include: 1)Positive Interdependence, 2) Group Processing, 3) Skilled Interpersonal Communication, 4) Face-to-Face Interactions, 5) Interdependence through Structure.

  • Interaction through Activity
  • Learners help, assist, encourage, and support each others’ efforts to learn.
  • Individual Accountability

The performance of each individual learner is assessed and the results given back to the group and the individual.

Interaction through Reflection – This can be achieved by having the student process at the end of working together, their functioning by answering two questions:

  • What did each member do that was helpful for the group?
  • What can each member do to make the group work better?

Skilled communication is necessary for effective group functioning. Learners must have, and use, the needed leadership, decision making, trust-building, effective communication, and conflict-management skills.

Cooperation can be in or out of class where learning can directly interact. However with computer conferencing software such as Skype and Zoom students can also connect face to face online as well.

Learners believe that they are linked together; they cannot succeed unless the other members of the group succeed (and vice versa). They “sink or swim together.”

Why Use Cooperative Learning?

When you begin to think about the skills most needed in the work place, it becomes clear that including cooperative learning experiences is of outmost importance.  Industry requires people who can work cooperatively in teams. The Conference Board of Canada has said that learners need academic skills, personal skills and cooperative or teamwork skills. Schools and colleges generally do a good job of the academic skills but often neglect the personal and teamwork skills because they see them as the responsibility of the home.

  • how to effectively listen to one another
  • how to share information
  • how to be considerate
  • how to use positive words of praise
  • how to disagree with an opinion or an issue rather than with the person expressing the idea
  • how to encourage all to participate
  • how to compromise to reach an agreement
  • how to evaluate the group’s efforts
  • how to evaluate one’s personal contributions to the group
  • how to be culturally sensitive and aware

Researchers have found that 90 to 95% of the people who lose their jobs do so because they cannot get along with other people on the job. Only 5 or 10 percent (depending on which studies you read) of people lose their jobs because they cannot do the work. Cooperative learning helps people learn social skills and therefore increases the chances that they will be able to keep the jobs for which we are training them.

Cooperative learning is supported by one of the strongest research traditions in education, with many hundreds of studies conducted across a wide range of subject areas and age groups (for reviews, see Bossert, 1988-1989; Cohen, 1994; Johnson & Johnson, 1989; Sharan, 1980; Slavin, 1995). This large body of research suggests that student to student collaboration conducted in a manner consistent with cooperative learning principles produces superior results on a host of variables, including achievement, thinking skills, interethnic relations, liking for school, and self-esteem.

How to Instruct Cooperative Team Skills

It is important that students clearly know the team function skills you want them to work on and why; make the link between the skills and the learning outcomes and goals. The more you can help learners see the need for the skill, the better.

You can achieve this by addressing the following:

  • Communicate how the cooperative team skills benefits
  • Ensure that students understand what cooperative team skills are being focused on and evaluated
  • Demonstrate and model the behaviors you want students to emulate
  • Provide regular time during class for students to debrief and reflect
  • Incorporate positive feedback techniques, such as highlighting three things well done and one that would benefit from improvement
  • Develop a group process to manage conflict

To learn more:

Extend Your Learning

  • Cooperative Learning Institute – The Cooperative Learning Institute is an innovative nonprofit Institute established in 1987 to advance the understanding and practice of cooperation and constructive conflict resolution.
  • Group work: Using cooperative learning groups effectively – Many instructors from disciplines across the university use group work to enhance their students’ learning. Whether the goal is to increase student understanding of content, to build particular transferable skills, or some combination of the two, instructors often turn to small group work to capitalize on the benefits of peer-to-peer instruction.
  • What is Cooperative Learning? – Cooperative learning involves more than students working together on a lab or field project. It requires teachers to structure cooperative interdependence among the students.
  • Group & Cooperative Learning; Students as Classroom Leaders – Harvard University, includes videos and additional articles.