Doesn cooperative learning just provide a new excuse for students who are having a hard time to get someone else to do their work for them?
• Only if the teacher doesn’t structure it correctly. It is very important to make sure that the tasks put before the students include roles for each participant (such as facilitator, timekeeper, notetaker, monitor, etc.) and that explicit instructions are given to the group about the group’s goals and how progress will be assessed on both the individual and group level. • In fact, when these are in place, it is found that all students in the group advance and that relationships between previously competitive students become more cooperative and friendly. The ‘quicker’ students benefit greatly from teaching the information to their peers and the students who need more help to understand the lesson, benefit from the one-on-one instruction that cooperative learning provides. • How do I decide when to introduce cooperative learning into a unit or lesson? • How about the beginning, the middle or the end? There are, in fact, cooperative strategies for all aspects of a lesson, though it is n
