Cooperative Learning Environments and the Learning Commons

One of the weaknesses of the Guided Design method was that team performance was unpredictable – while most groups are likely to work well, there are bound to be one or more groups that inevitably become dysfunctional. The cooperative learning approach agrees that team based learning has much to offer – perhaps more than competitive learning arrangements, where student achievement is judged against a bell-curve; or individualistic learning constructs that emphasize personal mastery (Johnson, Johnson & Smith, 1998). The cooperative learning approach goes a step further than the Guided Design method by stressing the importance of managing team dynamics in an intentional and purposeful way (Johnson, Johnson & Smith, 1998). That is, instead of assigning projects or problems to a random assortment of individuals, instructors should aim to assemble well-structured teams that incorporate the following key elements:

• small group size (2 – 4 members)
• individual accountability
• positive interdependence (individual success and that of the group is perceived as being closely linked by all members)
• group processing skills development (assign roles such as leading, recording, reporting, monitoring; initiate process improvement strategies; encourage positive communication strategies, etc.)

Teams that incorporate these elements are more likely to allow for positive exchanges among group members and ultimately enhance individual student learning within the group (Johnson, Johnson & Smith, 1998; Haller, 2000; Millis, 2002).

I think the greatest challenge in applying this approach in library instruction is that my interactions with students are often so short-lived and ad hoc in nature. Often I might work with a group that has already been established by the course instructor, or work with one or two members of a team who's role is to gather information. I forgot to mention this in my last week's post, but one of the things that stood out to me in Casada & DeShazer's (1995) discussion of using the guided design method was regarding the amount of time it took to get the students to understand the team learning process through out a semester long course – with some of them never quite getting it. That made me wonder to what extent any group based activity in a 50 minute session could be effective. Johnson, Johnson & Smith (1998) do offer three interrelated ways to use cooperative learning: formal cooperative learning, informal cooperative learning, and cooperative base groups. The informal category is definitely the most applicable to library workshop settings:

Informal cooperative learning groups are used primarily to enhance direct instruction (presentations, demonstrations, films, videos); they are typically temporary and ad hoc, formed for a brief period of time (such as intermittent two- to four-minute discussions during a class session). Instructors may use informal cooperative-learning groups during a class by having students turn to a classmate near them to discuss briefly a question posed by the instructor or to summarize what their instructor has just presented. Doing so focuses student attention on the material and ensures that students process it cognitively.

In the past I have conducted workshops where I prepared a bowl of candy and divided the class into small groups of 4 students or so. Then I got the students to work in those temporary groups to answer questions on a worksheet. The worksheet had three different sections and each section introduced different types of business information: industries, companies, markets. If a team completed a section first, then everyone in that team was allowed to 'partake of the candy bowl'. Since there were three sections, there were three chances for any of the teams to win. At the end of the class I also made a representative from each of the teams to come up and demonstrate how they got the answers for that section of the worksheet. I don't think I captured all of the elements of cooperative learning as listed above, but for a 50 minute session I thought it was not too shabby – also, it was before I really knew about the specific tenets of cooperative learning theory. I was just trying to make the session more enjoyable and interesting - therefore help with retention.

Beyond library workshops, I have observed in passing, some of the other types of cooperative learning taking place in the library. Particularly in the Learning Commons area, I often see students in pairs or small groups using whiteboards to review anything from physical anatomy to algebra equations.

Reading these articles made me wonder if there is anything more the Libraries could be doing to promote different types of cooperative learning, in addition to the spaces, furniture, and equipment that we provide.

In an online environment the instructor can't rely on direct observation of group dynamics and has to trust the reporting of individual members to a large extent. I guess if you have groups meet synchronously in live sessions using Elluminate or other chat/teleconference tools, you can drop in to 'observe' how things are going, but it is still more difficult to read than face to face instances. Online instruction often begins with introductions that are recorded, so in that sense it may be easier to note individual characteristics for assembling and monitoring them over time through discussion posts.



References

Haller, C.R., Gallagher, V.J., Weldon, T.L., & Felder, R.M. (2000). Dynamics of peer education in cooperative learning workgroups. Journal of Engineering Education 89(3), 285-293.

Johnson, D.W., Johnson, R.T., & Smith, K. A. (1998). Cooperative learning returns to college: What evidence is there that it works? Change, 27-35.

Millis, B.J. (2002). Enhancing learning and more! Through cooperative learning. Manhattan, KS: The IDEA Center.