Zhaxylyk Ryssaldiyev, Gulzira Bakhytkyzy

Taraz State Pedagogical Institute, Kazakhstan

ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF COOPERATIVE LEARNING

Newton lists over 50 benefits provided by cooperative learning. These benefits can be summarized into four major categories: social, psychological, academic and assessment [1; 32].

Cooperative learning promotes social interactions; thus students benefit in a number of ways from the social perspective. By having the students explain their reasoning and conclusions; cooperative learning helps develop oral communication skills. Because of the social interaction among students, cooperative learning can be used to model the appropriate social behaviors necessary for employment situations. By following the appropriate structuring for cooperative learning, students are able to develop and practice skills that will be needed to function in society and the workplace. These skills include: leadership, decision-making, trust building, communication and conflict-management.

The cooperative environment also develops a social support system for students. Other students, the instructor, administrators, other school staff, and potentially parents become integral parts of the learning process, thus supplying multiple opportunities for support to the students.

Students also benefit psychologically from cooperative learning. Johnson and Johnson claim, "Cooperative learning experiences promote more positive attitudes" toward learning and instruction than other teaching methodologies. Because students play an active role in the learning process in cooperative learning, student satisfaction with the learning experience is enhanced. Cooperative learning also helps to develop interpersonal relationships among students. The opportunity to discuss their ideas in smaller groups and receive constructive feedback on those ideas helps to build student self-esteem. In a lecture format, individual students are called upon to respond to a question in front of the entire class without having much time to think about his/her answer. Cooperative learning creates a safe, nurturing environment because solutions come from the group rather than from the individual. Errors in conclusions and thought processes are corrected within the group before they are presented to the class.

Students also tend to be inspired by instructors who take the time to plan activities which promote an encouraging environment. Receiving encouragement in a cooperative setting from both the instructor and peers helps to develop higher self-efficacy. As a result of higher self-efficacy, student grades tend to increase; thus, cooperative learning methods provide several academic benefits for students. Research indicates that students who were taught by cooperative methods learned and retained significantly more information than students being taught by other methods. Requiring students to verbalize their ideas to the group helps them to develop more clear concepts; thus, the thought process becomes fully embedded in the students' memory. Murphy supports this concept in his research on egocentric speech by claiming that verbalization plays a significant role in task solution [2; 12]. Discussions within the groups lead to more frequent summarization because the students are constantly explaining and elaborating, which in turn validates and strengthens thoughts. Students also benefit from cooperative learning academically in the sense that there is more of a potential for success when students work in groups. Individuals tend to give up when they get stuck, whereas a group of students is more likely to find a way to keep going. Cooperative learning calls for self-management from students because they must come prepared with completed assignments and they must understand the material which they have compiled. As a result, a more complete understanding of the material is developed.

There are also many benefits of cooperative learning from the aspect of assessment. It provides instant feedback to the students and instructor because the effectiveness of each class can be observed. As instructors move around the room and observe each group of students interacting and explaining their theories, they are able to detect misconceptions early enough to correct them. Only a few minutes of observation during each class session can provide helpful insight into students' abilities and growth.

Cooperative teaching methods also utilize a variety of assessments. Grades are not dependent solely on tests and individual assignments which only allow for right or wrong responses, leaving little or no room for reflection and discussion of error or misconceptions. With cooperative learning, instructors can use more authentic assessments such as observation, peer assessment and writing reflections.

One good advantage of cooperative learning is that it helps each member of the group to understand the issue thoroughly thus, the information about the topic is retained better on students’ brain.

Cooperative learning produces greater student achievement than traditional learning methodologies. Strain found that 63% of the cooperative learning groups analyzed had an increase in achievement [3; 14]. Students who work individually must compete against their peers to gain praise or other forms of rewards and reinforcements. In this type of competition many individuals attempt to accomplish a goal with only a few winners. The success of these individuals can mean failures for others. There are more winners in a cooperative team because all members reap from the success of an achievement. Low achieving students tend to work harder when grouped with higher achieving students. There is competition among groups in cooperative learning. Some forms of group competition promote cohesiveness among group members and group spirit.

Cooperative learning has social benefits as well as academic. One of the essential elements of cooperative learning is the development of social skills. Children learn to take risks and are praise for their contribution. They are able to see points of view other than their own. Such benefits contribute to the overall satisfaction of learning and schooling. Students work with classmates who have different learning skills, cultural background, attitudes, and personalities. Heterogeneous groups promote student learning. These differences forces them to deal with conflicts and interact with others. Social interaction improves communication skills that become a necessity to functioning in society.

Schools are moving towards implementing higher technology and computers have become a norm. Students are able to gain more skills through computer peer tutoring in a cooperative setting. Students who work on computers have a natural tendency to help their peers even without suggestion by the teacher. By using cooperative learning less equipment is necessary therefore money is saved without sacrificing the quality of education.

Disadvantages.

Cooperative Learning has many disadvantages that could cause the process to be more complicated than first perceived. Sharan discusses the issue regarding the constant evolution of cooperative learning is discussed as a threat [4; 50]. Due to the fact that cooperative learning is constantly changing, there is the possibility that teachers may become confused and lack complete understanding of the method. Teachers implementing cooperative learning may also be challenged with resistance and hostility from students who believe that they are being held back by their slower teammates or by students who are less confident and feel that they are being ignored or demeaned by their team

Teachers who are unfamiliar with cooperative learning may not initially accept this style of learning because they may feel they will lose control of their classroom, or they may be unsure of the techniques used or possibly even think that it is too time consuming. In this next section, we will discuss some of the possible drawbacks to cooperative learning.

Loss of Control - Cooperative learning is a structured approach that requires instructor support and guidance. In order for cooperative learning to be utilized in the classroom, instructors must receive training to be proficient in implementing the techniques. Maximum learning will only emerge if proper training is received by the teachers and then transferred to the student.

Teachers may resist using cooperative learning techniques in their classroom because they are afraid they may lose control of their teaching routine. Cooperative learning takes time to implement; therefore, initial lessons may take longer. Once students and the instructor are comfortable with the process, then the amount of time for each lesson decreases [5; 20].

Teachers may have a difficult time giving up their control of the content that is being covered. They are accustomed to presenting the curriculum to the students and are unable to give students the freedom to learn on their own. Students learning only one part of the curriculum in their group may make an instructor anxious about what their students know.

Showing their expertise in a subject area is important for some instructors. Giving up the opportunity to show off this expertise may deter teachers from using cooperative learning in their classrooms. Also, if students are expected to explore on their own, then they may have questions that the instructor cannot answer. Both of these possibilities may cause an instructor to lose confidence in her teaching abilities. Instructors can still be experts, but they will be using their knowledge as a facilitator rather than a giver of information.

Bibliography

1. Newton, J. 2001. Options for vocabulary learning through communication tasks.

2. D. Murphy. 1987. Language Learning Tasks. Englewood Cliffs N.J.: Prentice Hall International.

3. Strain, P. 1997. SLA Research and Language Teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

4. Sharan, P. 1997. Task type and task processing conditions as influences on foreign language performance.

5. Nunan, D. 1987. Communicative language teaching: Making it work.