6.
Experiential Learning / Collaborative Learning
Variations:
a. Student Teams Achievement Division (STAD - Slavin)
Steps:
1. teacher presents new academic information to students each week using verbal
presentation or
text.
2. students in a class are divided into 4 or 5 member heterogeneous learning teams.
3. members in the team help each other learn by using a variety of cooperative study
methods,
quizzing and scoring procedure
b. Jigsaw (Aranson, Slavin)
Students are assigned to 5 or 6 member heterogeneous study team.
Academic materials are presented to the students in text form.
Each student has the responsibility to learn a portion of the material.
Members from different teams with the same topic (called the expert group) meet to study
and
help each other learn their topic.
Then students return to home team and teach each other members what they have learned.
c. Group Investigation (Thelan Sharan) – This is the most complex of the cooperative
learning
approaches and the most difficult to implement. In contrast to STAD and Jigsaw, students
are
involved in planning both the topics for study and how to proceed with their investigation.
Teachers who use GI divide their classes into 5 or 6 member heterogeneous groups (source
instances by friendship or interest). Students select topics for study, pursue in-depth
investigation
of chosen subtopic then prepare and present a report to the whole class.
Steps of GI approach
1. topic selection
2. cooperative learning
3. implementation
4. analysis and synthesis
5. presentation of final product
6. evaluation
d. Structural Approach ( Kagen 1993) – Has much in common with other approaches, the
structural
approach emphasizes the use of particular structures designed to influence student
interaction
patterns. Call for students to work independently in small groups and are characterized by
cooperative rather than individual rewards. Some structures have the goal of increasing
student
acquisition of academic content (think-pair-share numbered heads together). Others are
designed to
teach social and group skills (active listening and time tokens).
e. Team-Games-Tournaments(TGT) (De Vries & Slavin, 1978) – Similar to STAD in
that the
teacher presents information to students and have them help one another learn. The
difference lies in
the quizzes being replaced with tournament and students compete to gain points for their
home team.
TGT is suited to the same subject matter and objectives of STAD.
f. Dyadic-Cooperative Learning – Simplest form of cooperative learning and in many
cases most
efficient form of group work. Students interact in pairs after reading a selection of the
material. They
come to agreement to the important points and over-all meaning of each section.
Afterwards Ss quiz
each other. Lastly, teacher gives the whole class a test.
