2. Robert and David Johnson
Brothers and fellow professors in the College
of Education and Human
Development, Roger and David Johnson are
the nation’s leading researchers on
cooperative learning. They direct the
Cooperative Learning Center which focuses
on making classrooms and schools more
cooperative places and on teaching
cooperative skills: leadership, communication,
decision making, trust building, and conflict
resolution.
3. Three basic ways students can
interact as they learn:
They can compete to see who is "best"; they
can work individualistically on their own
toward a goal without paying attention to
other students; or they can
work cooperatively with a vested interest in
each other’s learning as well as their own.
There is a difference between "having
students work in a group" and structuring
students to work cooperatively. There needs
to be an accepted common goal on which
the group will be rewarded for their efforts.
4. Collaborative Learning
Collaborative Learning: An instruction method
in which students work in groups toward a
common academic goal.
The active exchange of ideas within small
groups not only increases interest among the
participants but also promotes and enhances
critical thinking.
Critical-thinking Items: Items that involve
analysis, synthesis, and evaluation of the
concepts.
5. How Cooperative Learning
Works:
After more than 20 years of research on more
than 80 research studies, and reviews of
existing research on cooperation and
learning, Roger and David Johnson have no
doubts: cooperative learning works on favor
of students, teachers, schools, and
communities. As Roger Johnson says,
“Human beings learn more, flourish, and
connect more when they’re cooperating and
less when they’re competing or working in an
isolated fashion.”
6. Five Key Components of
Cooperative Learning:
Positive interdependence : Each individual depends
on and is accountable to the others, a built-in
incentive to help, accept help, and work for others.
Individual accountability: Each person in the group
learns the material.
Promotive interaction: Group members help one
another, share information, offer clarifying
explanations.
Social skills: Leadership, communication.
Group processing: Assessing how effectively they are
working with one another.
7. Two Heads Learn Better Than One
This is an article written by the Johnson brothers, in 1988,
based on many researches done on cooperative learning.
Comparing student-student interaction patterns indicates
that students learn more effectively when they work
cooperatively and data shows:
Students are more positive about school, subject areas,
and teachers or professors when they are structured to
work cooperatively.
Students are more positive about each other.
Students are more effective interpersonally In
a cooperative learning situation.
Interaction is characterized by positive goal
interdependence with individual accountability.
8. According to Johnson and Johnson
(1986), there is persuasive evidence that
cooperative teams achieve at higher
levels of thought and retain information
longer than students who work quietly as
individuals.
