Cross cutting theme: Collaborative Learning

Collaborative vs Individually
organised classrooms
I win, you win Traditional teaching methods
tend to shy away from group-
What do we mean by collaborative learning? type learning. Many teachers
To collaborate means to work together still believe that a classroom
towards a common goal. Collaborative learning organised individually, and
occurs when learners are where silence reigns is by far
organised into small groups, the best learning environment
and they work towards for learners. This quiet and
common learning goals. highly structured environment
The most common forms may suit the teacher, but
of collaborative learning research shows that individual,
are group-work and peer silent work is quite an ineffective
tutoring. learning environment and can
contribute to the continuation
of behavioural, emotional, and
cognitive difficulties.

Some of the difficulties that may arise in individually organised classrooms are:
• When learners get “stuck”, and they cannot ask for help, they tend to simply stop
working and fail to complete the task.
• Learners often do not ask teachers for help when they are stuck. They either cannot be
bothered or may not want to appear stupid in front of their peers.
• Learners with attention difficulties will not be able to focus on this type of activity for
too long and they will either start to daydream or they will start to fidget and become
disruptive.

Why Collaborative Learning?

Collaborative learning:

allows learners does not only also teaches creates a makes for less
to work focus on the many complex simultaneous work in the
together in transfer of processes such interaction (at long run, as
small groups, the content as social skills, the same time) the teacher is
following of a specific thinking skills rather than a no longer the
a structure learning area and information sequential (one pivot for all
devised by the sharing after the other) learning.
teacher techniques. one, saving
much time and
promoting more
task activity.

What the research says…

Some of the greatest educational researchers of our time, namely Vygotsky, Piaget and
Feuerstein, all conclude that learning takes place through our interactions with others. In
other words, learning is very much a social process (It is also the S in S.P.E.C.I.A.L. i.e. Social
Interaction).

Most teachers grumble, sigh, and shake their heads when they hear the term “group-work”.
Many teachers are af raid to use this technique as they feel they will lose control of the
discipline in their class. There are also many teachers who have tried group work and after
one day say that it doesn’t work!

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Using collaborative learning is however a logical method of instruction because most of our
learning comes f rom the help and guidance of other people. For example, if you come across
something in your life that you find difficult to learn or understand, your natural instinct is
to ask someone for help. Collaborative learning is, therefore, compatible with human nature.
The development of social capital (the wealth of people connection) is achieved through
collaboration when we reach out for help or to help.

Research shows that learners make the

following gains when using collaborative
learning methods:

higher achievement than

with individualistic and better self-control
competitive methods

greater intrinsic
more positive social motivation
development

significant self- improved learning

esteem gains climate

Why does collaborative learning work so well?

• Learners talk more – but appropriately and meaningfully, which enhances vocabulary
and language development.
• Small groups can result in lowered anxiety.
• There is more clarity on task structure.
• There is more time on the task.
• There is more time to practice various processes and tasks.
• It allows for more rewards, both immediate and postponed (praise and positive regard
from peers and the teacher).
• It allows for more facilitative and encouraging interaction between group members.
• The teacher is not always lecturing and policing learners’ behaviour. His or her teaching
abilities and knowledge can, therefore, be used more effectively.

Some notes on preparing you and your learners for collaborative learning
1. If you want to use collaborative learning effectively, and you haven’t done so before, you
must take the time to explain what this concept means to your class. If you suddenly
place them into groups without a clear explanation you may well find yourself in the
middle of a riot situation, and you will be put off collaborative learning for life!
2. You can explain to them the benefits (listed above) of this method of facilitation. You can
point out that:
- it is one of the main skills of an entrepreneurial way-of-being.
- without collaboration their ability to solve problems and find innovative solutions is
severely diminished.
- that each member of the group bring his/her own particular strengths, background
knowledge, interests, and skills - making the group diverse and stronger.
- that as individuals we have only certain skills and strengths, but “Teams (groups)
should be well-rounded precisely because we, as individuals, are not.” Rath and
Conchie (2008), Gallup
3. After having discussed the concept, you and your class need to make the rules together.
Many teachers make the mistake of imposing their rules on learners. The result of this is

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 that the learners will spend a lot of time breaking the rules. For some reason, people are
very attracted to the idea of breaking rules and take great delight in getting away with
breaking rules! Children are no different. As you may have noticed, many learners spend
a lot of their time breaking teachers' rules instead of getting on with their work.

Steps for making effective group work / classroom rules

3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4

Discuss the rules Ask the class for their Now ask the class Now decide
that people must own class rules. You why they think together the
follow in “real life” will find that they each rule should consequences of:
and why these rules come up with many exist. By doing (a) following the
are important (for ideas. Write them this, you are giving rules and
example, road rules down on the board value and meaning (b) breaking the
or sports rules). and edit where to the rules rules.
Learners need to necessary. and reasonable
understand that explanations as
rules do not only to why they are
exist at school, but important.
that everyone in the
world must follow
rules for safety and
order.

By including learners in their own rule-making, you give them a sense of autonomy (the L –
Learner Autonomy in S.P.E.C.I.A.L.) and they are less likely to break rules that they have made
for themselves.

Other useful tips before implementing collaborative learning

• Have a quiet signal (e.g., a bell) to assist you in communicating with the groups.
• The greater the structure the better the groups will function both in terms of work done
and the level of co-operation achieved.
• Provide the group that is working well with positive attention to encourage the other
groups to work in the same way. Resist the urge to pay negative attention to the group
that is not working well.
• The teacher can assist learners to work collaboratively by modelling collaborative
behaviour.
• Start with simple lessons. Initially use as many team-building exercises as possible.
• Be patient with everyone, including yourself, as this turn-around in thinking requires a
period of adaptation.

Collaborative Learning
Strategy 1 - Peer tutoring

What is Peer tutoring

Peer tutoring is when you use stronger learners to help learners who need
additional support. It is a simple and useful means of instruction that has much
value for teachers, tutors (the stronger learners who teach), and tutees (the
weaker learners who learn). Peer tutoring can ease the strain of dealing with
large and troublesome classes.

How to implement peer tutoring in the classroom

The simplest way of implementing peer tutoring in the classroom is by pairing together
stronger learners with those who need support. These pairs of learners then sit together,
and the stronger learner takes on the role of tutor or teacher and guide, explaining and
interpreting information and skills for the tutee.

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When planning the peer groups take the following into account:
• Never let the learners choose their own pairs.
• Be careful that the learners you pair together also get on socially. If they cannot bear the
sight of one another this scheme will not work at all.
• Explain why you are using this method so that learners get an overview of the benefits
and are thus motivated to take it seriously (Recap section above outlining this.)

Difficulties you may experience and how to solve them

As with all new things, you will probably have some "teething problems" with peer tutoring
when you introduce it in your classroom. Here are some comments from teachers about
some of the difficulties they have experienced and how they overcame them.

Problem 1 Solution
"The first time I You need to get the whole class's consent and understanding to
tried it, the kids overcome this problem. First explain the concept to the whole class
thought it was f ree and get their opinions. Then explain to your learners that you want
time and they did to make school easier for them and that peer tutoring will be a
no work fun and easy way of helping them. You may even single out some
at all." learners, for example, "Jimmy, you really enjoy maths; wouldn't it
be nice to share your passion for maths with someone who might
struggle more with maths?" Hopefully the answer will be yes!

Another part of this solution is to have a special meeting with the

tutors and explain the value and special nature of their role. Try to
get them on your side by explaining that they are now more like
teachers than learners. Remind them that the role of the teacher
is to guide and support, not to be the “expert” and “tell”. You need
to explain how much you need their help and thank them for their
time. Once you have their co-operation and they see themselves as
being important, you shouldn't have much trouble with discipline.

Solution
Problem 2 Once again, be very careful which learners you put together. If
"My tutors you see any friction, make changes immediately. Also, you need
started fighting to make your tutors aware that their role involves kindness,
with my tutees, consideration, empathy and understanding as they guide and
calling them support their tutees.
stupid idiots."

Solution
Problem 3 If you are used to a classroom where the learners work individually
"My class and in silence, then you will experience a big increase in noise level
became much because the pairs will be constantly talking to each other. This is
noisier, and the healthy noise and means that the pairs are working well. Please
other teachers note, if you are using peer tutoring and there is silence in the
complained." classroom, then something has gone wrong!

If you are the only teacher who is trying peer tutoring, then you
will have to explain this method of instruction to your principal and
colleagues to get their support.

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Peer tutoring for reading

If you have a big class, you can use peer tutoring to help you with reading development. Pair
up the stronger with less able readers and have them either sit at their desks or let them sit
outside. Instruct the tutor to listen to the tutee and help her/him correct mistakes and read
difficult words. The tutee needs to read the passage over a few times until s/he can read all
the words on her/his own.

This lessens the strain on you because you won't have to worry about trying to listen to
everyone's reading every day. With peer tutoring, your weaker readers will receive individual
attention every day as well as extra practice. You can use this time to either work with
extremely difficult readers or listen to a few individual learners everyday to monitor progress
and do ongoing assessment.

Peer tutoring for Maths

Peer tutoring also works well with Maths, which seems to be a subject that many learners
find difficult. First explain what you want the class to do and then allow peer tutoring to
take over. Instead of you now going around to every learner who needs support, and re-
explaining the instructions, the tutor will do this for you. Once again, this frees up a lot of
time for you to walk around and assess books or do some individual work with learners who
need your input.

What are the benefits of peer tutoring?

The use of peer tutoring is aimed at being an "I win, you win" method in that it
helps tutors, tutees, and teachers.

How does it help tutors? • It is believed that one of the best ways to learn is to
teach someone else. A tutor's own learning improves
as s/he gives clear and logical explanations to his/her
tutee. This is because the tutors must think through
their own knowledge very carefully and be sure of their
own understanding before they can help their partners.
• Tutors also benefit emotionally. Most studies show that
tutoring boosts the tutor’s self-esteem and confidence.
Tutors tend to feel valuable and useful, and the fact
that they help other people creates in them a very
positive self-image.
• Tutors who are highly active or very easily distracted
can benefit behaviourally. The fact that they are
constantly interacting with one other person in a useful
and satisfying way will tend to keep them focused and
busy and, therefore, less likely to waste their own and
other's time.
• Tutors also seem to develop better social skills. They
become more considerate of others and develop higher
levels of tolerance for learners who are different to
them.

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 All research indicates that tutees with this form of
How does it help tutees?
academic support cope better at school. Tutees' experience
of academic success due to peer tutoring, improves their
motivation. Tutees also show improved self-confidence
because of their improved schoolwork as well as the
individual support and attention that they get from the
tutor.

How does it help teachers? • Once peer tutoring is in progress you should have 100%
class participation, as one half will be learning, and
the other half will be teaching. Because all the learners
are busy working you will find that you spend far less
time dealing with inappropriate behaviour and trying
to encourage learners into sitting still and getting on
with their work. So, there are benefits in terms of better
discipline.
• Over time, your learners should show an overall
improvement in their academic skills and your
professionalism and job performance will be improved.
• Your learners will be happier and more productive.
You will have much more time during the school day to
focus on areas that really need attention.
• You will not feel exhausted, because the enormous task
of teaching, disciplining, supporting, listening, helping
and marking will become the shared responsibility of
you and the tutors.
• You will have the satisfaction of a job well done, which
will do wonders for your own self-image and motivation.

Collaborative Learning
Strategy 2 - Group-work

Group-work is as effective as peer tutoring but a bit more complex to

manage and monitor. Group-work means arranging the learners into small
groups of between four to six learners. The learners then must complete
tasks as a group.

Selecting your groups

It is best to select heterogeneous (Consisting of people with diverse characteristics) groups.

Try to put a few high achievers in each team. Mix language and gender too.
• Teams of four work well, as you can include pair work within the group.
• On occasion, allow your learners to pick preferred classmates to make up their group.
• You can also sometimes randomly assign learners to groups.

Effective group work

• The reason that group work often fails in classrooms is that teachers put children into
seated groups and then continue to expect them to work individually. This does not
work, as the learners simply take it as an opportunity to socialise.

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• For groups to be effective the work that they do has to be carefully planned.
• The goal of successful group work is that each member must have a specific task that
contributes to an outcome.
• As with all significant learning, ensure that the group:
- knows the goal of the exercise
- feels motivated because they see the relevance to them (purpose)
- is curious and intrigued by a question they want to know the answer to
- is guided by tasks that keep their attention and engagement
- doing something that makes them think deeply so that the learning is “posted” to
their long term memory.
How does group-work help learners?

Learners’ roles within the groups

To make sure that groups function optimally, it is useful to assign roles to each of the
learners. We often make the mistake of only assigning one member a role, that of group
leader. This often results in more damage than good as the leader invariably takes over
and makes the others do exactly what he or she wants.
It is therefore best to assign a role to each of the group members. These roles can vary
according to the task that has been set, for example:

For a discussion, one may select For a group project, one may select
the following roles: the following roles:
• A Taskmaster to keep the • A Taskmaster to keep the group
group on task on task
• A Gatekeeper to equalise • A Recorder to write down the
participation required information
• A Recorder to write down the • An Artist to decorate
group’s decisions or answers the project
• A Quiet Captain to make sure • A Materials Monitor to
that the group does not disturb obtain the necessary
the other groups materials and to make
sure that the group
tidies up after working

Make sure that you discuss what each role entails with your learners
to allow then to carry out their responsibilities adequately. Also, vary
the roles that you assign to each of your learners.

1. Learners get a sense of belonging by being in a group and as they begin to experience
some academic success, they become more motivated to learn and gain more
knowledge.
2. The learners need not depend entirely on the teacher. They come to depend a lot
more on themselves, as well as the other members of the group. Where learners work
individually, they depend almost entirely on the teacher and they have little incentive to
help each other as this kind of help feels like, or is regarded as, cheating.
3. Learners in groups also tend to put "loudmouths" in their place, especially if their
behaviour is detrimental to the overall function of the group. Therefore, groups can
alleviate many discipline problems in the classroom. This also allows for the practice of
self-regulation where individuals learn the appropriate ways of interacting when they are
in a group situation.
4. Learners talk more, which enhances vocabulary and language development.

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Here are some warm-up activities to use before you start with "real work".

Interviews
As a class or in each group, think up ten interesting interview questions to find
out information about the interviewee.
• Each learner must write these questions down.
• In pairs, the learners must interview each other and write down the answers.
• Once the interviews are over, the group members can report back to each other.

Sharing information
For this type of activity, Learner A thinks of a piece of information or thinks of something
that the other learners need to discover. It could be a word like “Politics”, or “tree”, or
“happy”. They do this by asking questions to which learners can only say yes/no, true/
false. Examples of this type of activity are:
• Mineral, animal, vegetable.
• 20 questions
• Guess what's in my hand
• Charades
• The 30 seconds game
The information that Learner A has can be specified by the teacher and could be linked
or confined to classroom learning.

Discovering identical pairs

A set of four similar pictures is given out to four learners. The fifth learner gets a copy of
one of these pictures. The fifth learner must question the other four learners to discover
who has the matching picture. Again, only yes/no or true/false answers must be given.
• Identical pairs can include written information for example a description of a holiday
destination or a description of a person.
• If you use written information, you will enrich this activity by including reading and
comprehension.

Discovering sequences or locations

Here, Learner A has a set of pictures arranged in a particular order. Learner B has the
same pictures but not in any order. Learner B must ask questions and discover the order
of the pictures f rom Learner A.
A more difficult version of this is where Learner A has a model of something (possibly
made of Lego or blocks). Learner B has the same pieces and must build the same model
by listening to Learner A's verbal instructions.

Justifying choices
This activity is sophisticated and makes strong demands on language
ability and group interaction.

Planning a holiday to _______.

1. Together with your learners, generate a list of items that could be taken on holiday to
the place you have chosen.
2. Each learner has a limited amount of luggage they can take. For example, 25 kg on a
plane, or 1 suitcase in a car or taxi.
3. As a group, the learners must make one list of what items they would pack and be
able to justify their choices.

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