The Beginner's Guide to Cooperative Learning E-Book

Drew Howard

• Herausgeber: Crown House Publishing
• Kategorie: Bildung
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 321

Beschreibung

The Education Endowment Foundation's Teaching and Learning Toolkit describes collaborative learning as an approach which 'involves pupils working together on activities or learning tasks' and in such a way that enables 'everyone to participate on a collective task that has been clearly assigned'. In the context of this book, Cooperative Learning relates to a number of such activities from simple memorising to more complex analysis and debating which are designed to boost learners' interdependence, participation and interaction. Drawing upon both research-informed theory and real-world examples, Jakob Werdelin and Drew Howard present both an insightful introduction to Cooperative Learning as a practice and philosophy and a practical guide to classroom application. The authors share their expertise on how to amplify the effect of current pedagogical approaches and schemes of work, simplify performance management as an empowering tool for teachers and leaders, and create an inclusive environment in which every pupil is able to fulfil their learning potential. Jakob and Drew also discuss how Cooperative Learning relates to a range of other aspects of teaching, including assessment, metacognition and Rosenshine's Principles. The book focuses on Catch1Partner as an exemplary Cooperative Learning Interaction Pattern (CLIP) as, by fully grasping the principles of staging and running Catch1Partner in its many forms, readers will then be better equipped with the foundational know-how to deploy other CLIPs, such as Sage and Scribe, Word-Round and Rotating Role Reading. The authors also provide a variety of ready-to-photocopy (and downloadable) sample teaching materials, tools, guidelines and an activity transcript in the appendices. Suitable for teachers and leaders in both primary and secondary school settings.

Leseprobe

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Praise for The Beginner’s Guide to Cooperative Learning

Jakob Werdelin and Drew Howard have produced an excellent guide to Cooperative Learning that provides teachers with a coherent philosophy and a detailed structure for bringing it to life in the classroom. Far beyond many teachers’ view of ‘group work’, the CLIPs concept is clearly defined with lots of examples. Most importantly, the authors have pitched high, insisting that all their suggested activities deliver the rigour required for PIES – the four requirements of positive interdependence, individual accountability, equal participation and simultaneous interaction which ensure that all children are participating, thinking and learning. This is great to see. Jakob and Drew’s audacious claim that Cooperative Learning is the solution to everything might be hard to accept, but nonetheless it’s an interesting challenge to explore and, as well as being practical as a handy guide, this book makes an engaging and compelling case for more Cooperative Learning in schools.

Tom Sherrington, author of The Learning Rainforest and Teaching WalkThrus

Forget everything you think you know about collaborative learning and the silly prog–trad debates which cloud the issue. This brilliant, powerful book seeks to redefine what Cooperative Learning is and – spoiler alert – it is not disorganised group work.

Written in an engaging and humorous yet authoritative and knowledgeable way, it defines the key concepts and explains the action steps which can be put in place to transform learning in our schools. After the theoretical and practical grounding of the first two chapters, each chapter thereafter is like a stand-alone unit, which can be dipped into as and when required. What’s more, the book features a variety of different subject-specific examples and covers a wide range of topics, including how Cooperative Learning links to Rosenshine’s principles, getting your teaching assistant involved and a real-life case study of how a school embedded the approach. The authors provide a step-by-step manual which will equip any teacher from any phase with all the tools to get impactful Cooperative Learning up and running in their classroom.

Haili Hughes, Head of Education, IRIS Connect, Senior Lecturer, University of Sunderland, author and speaker

BWhat I gathered very quickly is that Cooperative Learning is a simple yet incredibly powerful approach whereby learners are carefully trained to interact with one another and their learning in such a way that they do the hard work while also learning content quicker and gaining essential social skills. What’s not to like?

Stephen Chapman, Managing Director, Dragonfly Training Ltd

Tackling the often misunderstood and poorly applied principles of Cooperative Learning, this detailed and evidence-informed book sits astride traditionalist and progressive dichotomies, and provides proven step-by-step structures and strategies that have the potential to enhance and even transform your practice. An essential guide for anyone interested in fostering interdependence, accountability, participation and interaction within the classroom.

Jonathan Lear, teacher, speaker and author of The Monkey-Proof Box

The Beginner’s Guide to Cooperative Learning is for anyone who, like me, has been wondering just how to connect subject content with the art of being human. If you want great results and resilient capable young people who can hold their own in a conversation, take responsibility and engage intelligently with other people, this is the book for you. One of the most fascinating things, I find, is the necessary intimate connection between direct instruction from a capable teacher and the social construction that processes and integrates what has been taught through oracy and higher-level thinking.

This book does not fit into the traditional or progressive category in any way, shape or form; like all good teaching, it transcends simple lines in the sand. So, don’t let the title scare you if you are a traditionalist. If you are a fan of Barak Rosenshine you will not only enjoy the dedicated chapter on him, viewed through the lens of Tom Sherrington’s neat streamlining, but you will also recognise his principles in the most unlikely places on every page of highly child-centred learning in this book.

Catherine Brentnall, researcher and curriculum development consultant

In this thoughtful and useful book, Jakob and Drew clearly offer the busy classroom teacher the ‘how’ of Cooperative Learning as well as, importantly, the ‘why’. I’m all for any approach and pedagogy that encourages children and young people to find their learning voices, and this book enables the thoughtful teacher to do just that with their classes.

Hywel Roberts, teacher, speaker, writer and humorist

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To the people with whom we have worked.

Contents

Title PageDedicationIntroduction: Cooperative Learning and the COVID ComebackWhat’s in this book?Why read this book?Why pick some when you can just have it all?Why it’s not business as usualChapter 1.What is Cooperative Learning? (And Especially What It Isn’t)Why is it so important to delineate Cooperative Learning?The bigger pictureEvidenceKnowing the path vs. walking the pathBut what will Ofsted say?Chapter 2.Catch1Partner – an Exemplary CLIPWhy Catch1Partner?What is Catch1Partner?Using this guide effectivelyGetting off to a good startClassroom control: the silence signalCatch1Partner with materials – step by stepBasic rules of staging an activityActivity 1: Class-building (and introducing Catch1Partner to your class)Activity 2: Rapid recall as entertainmentActivity 3: Input processing through open questionsActivity 4: Treasure hunting for answers (and introducing peer learning)Activity 5: Integrating learners’ products in Catch1PartnerActivity 6: Metacognition through Catch1PartnerChapter 3.Cooperative Learning and Direct InstructionInstruction powers constructionTurning Rosenshine’s principles into practiceChapter 4.Cooperative Learning and Social ConstructionThe history of the inner voiceTypes of inner voiceThe Teaching and Learning CycleChapter 5.The Roles and Responsibilities of Cooperative Learning: What’s in It for You and Everyone Else?What’s in it for the teacher?What’s in it for the early career teacher?What’s in it for the teaching assistant?What’s in it for leadership?What’s in it for the SENCO?What’s in it for the multi-academy trust?What’s in it for parents?What’s in it for your learners?Chapter 6.The Story of Stalham: A Reflection on Implementation Across a SchoolPreparation – lining up your own ducks firstImplementationBehaviour, not just for learningSustainabilityBeyond StalhamChapter 7.Teaching Material: The Stuff You Don’t Need to BuyPicking good materialsLearner-produced teaching materials and motivationExamples of simple materialsOnline materialsMistakes and materialsMaterials, Cooperative Learning and reducing your workloadChapter 8.The Pitfalls of Cooperative Learning: Things That Go ‘Bump’ in the ClassroomWhy Cooperative Learning fails on a school-wide levelWhy CLIPs fail in classroomsCommon questions from teachersChapter 9.Cooperative Learning and Other StrategiesLesson plansTalk for WritingSOLO taxonomyOracyA Conclusion of SortsAppendix A:More CLIPs – a Tactical ToolkitWord-RoundMeet in the MiddleRotating Role ReadingSage and ScribePing-Pong-PairsAppendix B:Sample FlashcardsKey Stage 2–3: Class-buildingKey Stage 2–3: During/after reading a story/playKey Stage 2–4: Metacognitive questions following the presentation of a solution (with worked examples) to a procedural taskAppendix C:Cooperative Learning ChecklistAppendix D:CLIP Reflection and Coaching Guide and Assessment Guide for Teachers and TAsCLIP reflection and coaching guide for teachers and TAs (pre-activity)CLIP assessment guide for teachers (post-activity)Appendix E:Quick ReferenceAppendix F:Word-Round Transcript from a Key Stage 2 Maths LessonBibliographyIndexCopyright

1

Introduction: Cooperative Learning and the COVID Comeback

When we began drafting this book in 2017, our intention was simply to share with colleagues the inner workings of Cooperative Learning at Stalham Academy in Norfolk, and its wider multi-academy trust (MAT), over a number of years. Looking back, 2017 seems a lifetime and a world away. In general terms, of course, Cooperative Learning is always relevant because it is a cost-effective way to promote academic performance and social skills. More specifically to the 2020s, Cooperative Learning is relevant because it effortlessly operationalises key theories underpinning the 2019 Ofsted Inspection Framework. These and many other arguments for the adoption of Cooperative Learning are expounded throughout this book. However, COVID-19 has added entirely new levels of importance, and some degree of urgency, which deserves to be touched on separately.

It is reasonable to say that, in spite of a monumental effort by schools, the pandemic has had a devastating effect on all areas of education. In primary schools alone, the attainment gap has widened by up to 52% during school closures, according to Schools Week.1 Unsurprisingly, learners with lower socio-economic status take the brunt of this blow, and within that group those with language barriers, mental health problems or prior learning difficulties will be affected even more. We can also add to this factors such as race and gender. Beyond this learning gap proper, it is expected that inequality in ‘socio-emotional skills’ will also increase.2 Crucially, the pandemic has widened the already stubborn 2language gap, with Ofsted warning that children hit hardest are ‘regressing in basic skills and learning’, including language, communication and oral fluency.3

The upshot is that, a decade after the world’s last COVID-19 patient has been discharged, the education sector will still be catching up on the general learning loss, as well as an unprecedented gap in social, emotional, cognitive and language skills for a vastly enlarged group of vulnerable learners. If you are like most teaching professionals, tackling all these challenges coherently with a patchwork of individual interventions seems more than overwhelming. But, what if you could find one relatively simple, comprehensive approach – a framework of sorts? You would need an approach that simultaneously re-forms institutional cohesion, tackles emotional and social lockdown fallout and increases the volume of learning per lesson to close the gaps. And, this intervention of yours must do these three things for every learner regardless of level, race or socio-economic background and must work across any subject and age group; it must use your current schemes of work; and it must fit with or enhance any other approaches, while adding as little as humanly possible to teacher workload.

It is our hope that Cooperative Learning can meet all of these requirements.

What’s in this book?

Whether you approach this book as a teacher or a leader, this Beginner’s Guide to Cooperative Learning is a step-by-step manual to get simple, powerful Cooperative Learning up and running in your class or school. The objective is to make the learners responsible for their learning, leaving you free to concentrate on the teaching. Based on best practice developed over many years, it provides precise, detailed instructions to make you an expert practitioner. However, for all its precision, Cooperative Learning is far from prescriptive. Rather, it lets you get on, but get on better, in a way that you are comfortable with, using your own trusted materials and systems. Best of all, it lets you experiment and develop your own practice. Step into the driver’s seat and let the kids do the pedalling.

This book does not claim to cover all of the many varying interpretations of the term ‘cooperative learning’. Instead, the principles and practices you see here have been applied successfully by ourselves on a wide range of learners in the UK (and through Jakob’s 3international work in other educational cultures). Although the age groups range from children in the early years foundation stage (EYFS) explaining simple shapes, right up to university lecturers elaborating on how to best teach the content of their PhD,4 the examples and transcripts in this book will focus on Key Stages 1 to 4.

We want this book to work for you. Within reasonable limits, the chapters are designed as stand-alone units, directly accessible as required by your individual needs and interests. However, the chapters marked with asterisks (*) are must-reads for everyone. Aside from the definitions in Chapter 1 and the detailed instructions for roll-out in Chapter 2 (which should be followed stringently!), you may approach this book in a non-linear fashion. Some readers might prioritise context and theory, so may skip forward to the chapters on the relationship between Cooperative Learning and direct instruction or social construction (Chapters 3 and 4). Others might prefer to try out a couple of activities and then review these chapters in light of their experiences.

Of course, as you begin to deploy Cooperative Learning in your classroom, you can dip in and out as the situation demands. Need to get your teaching assistant (TA) on board? Find TAs in Chapter 5 on roles and responsibilities. Need to see the big picture? Learn how one school successfully developed a MAT approach in Chapter 6. Dennis the Menace giving you trouble? You will find him and his kin dealt with in Chapter 8. With this non-linearity in mind, we hope you will forgive some repetition of key points. Its purpose is to allow random snacking.

The following chapter outline is there to help you make these choices. Remember that the chapters marked with asterisks (*) are must-reads for everyone.

Introduction

This chapter provides a bit of context and gives you the reasons why you may wish to read and apply this book, from the perspective of the bigger scheme of things. We suggest reading the first section as a minimum.

4Chapter 1: What is Cooperative Learning? (And Especially What It Isn’t)*

A better title might have been ‘What isn’t Cooperative Learning?’ Here, we unpick some critical misconceptions and demonstrate how Cooperative Learning negates the politically charged conflict between progressive vs. traditional, student-led vs. teacher-led and so on. We then refer to some research evidence and introduce and define the Cooperative Learning Interaction Pattern (CLIP), which is undoubtedly the most important concept in this book. We also discover how Cooperative Learning relates to some of the research findings that underpin the 2019 Inspection Framework to enlighten your conversation with inspectors.

The Cooperative Learning Interaction Pattern (CLIP) is undoubtedly the most important concept in this book.

Chapter 2: Catch1Partner – an Exemplary CLIP*

This chapter is the heart of this volume. It is a step-by-step guide to introducing and growing the versatile CLIP dubbed Catch1Partner in your school. Here, you will learn how to facilitate social skills, language acquisition (general and subject specific), revision, metacognition, formative assessment, self-assessment, peer feedback and a whole lot of other things – with relatively little work on your part. Our intention is that by fully mastering the principles of staging and running Catch1Partner in its many forms, you will be ready to apply these skills to any other CLIP (there are more in Appendix A).

Chapter 3: Cooperative Learning and Direct Instruction*

The individual Cooperative Learning activities are in themselves incredibly powerful, but using them at the appropriate time and place in a lesson really takes them to another level. Based on Barak Rosenshine’s famous paper ‘Principles of Instruction’,5 this section puts Cooperative Learning into the context of a best practice lesson and drives home Cooperative Learning’s dependence on direct instruction.

5Chapter 4: Cooperative Learning and Social Construction

This is a look at the mechanics behind the slick surface of well-executed Cooperative Learning. While not as central to your practical success, it does form a couplet of a sort with the previous chapter on direct instruction.

Chapter 5: The Roles and Responsibilities of Cooperative Learning: What’s in It for You and Everyone Else?

What’s in it for you? Because Cooperative Learning looks at human beings as the key resource in any situation, everyone has a unique part to play in a Cooperative Learning school, from the head teacher to the TA and right down to the youngest learners.

Chapter 6: The Story of Stalham: A Reflection on Implementation Across a School

Get inspired by finding out how Cooperative Learning played an integral part in moving a disintegrating, headless, freshly converted junior school from special measures to the nation’s top 500 league, with happy teachers, children and parents.

Chapter 7: Teaching Materials: The Stuff You Don’t Need to Buy

In this chapter you will learn how materials can be used weekly (or even daily) across classes for years on end to achieve different and specific outcomes. Note that revision, which is important enough in its own right, is only one of the more obvious benefits of reusing materials systematically. You will also learn how to adapt materials to tie your school community together in time as well as space. In the long run, time spent planning and resourcing can, and often does, reduce workload over time.

Chapter 8: The Pitfalls of Cooperative Learning – Things That Go ‘Bump’ in the Classroom*

The problem with turning children into your main classroom resource is that they are human beings, with all that it entails. What if someone just does not want to take part? What if they are teaching each other the wrong thing? This chapter comprises answers to common questions from teachers and school leaders who have trained with us.6

Chapter 9: Cooperative Learning and Other Strategies

Many teachers use the same basic structure across many of their lessons. Whether you have your own unique style or follow the guidance from works such as Shaun Allison and Andy Tharby’s Making Every Lesson Count series6 or Tom Sherrington’s Rosenshine’s Principles in Action,7 Cooperative Learning can slot straight in with what you are doing and strengthen each stage of your lesson. From SOLO taxonomy to Talk for Writing, Cooperative Learning will support, and in most cases enhance, any system in which you have previously invested.

Appendices

Once you have fully mastered Catch1Partner, by following the step-by-step instructions in Chapter 2, you and your learners should have the foundational know-how and experience to start deploying other CLIPs in your class and school, which you will find in Appendix A. We have included some ready-to-photocopy sample teaching materials, tools and guidelines in Appendix B.8Appendix C is a checklist of things to watch out for, and Appendix D provides some simple tools for peer and self-reflection (both of these resources are also photocopiable, for your convenience). The quick reference guide in Appendix E unpicks the acronyms used in this book (CLIP? PIES?) and provides a reminder of the four basic rules for staging an activity. Finally, we have included a full activity transcript which may inspire your use of the CLIP Word-Round in Appendix F.

Why read this book?

There are few certainties in life. However, education does seem to have three constants that affect every school from small rural primaries through to huge London colleges: policies change with each new government, money is short and classrooms are full of learners of all shapes and sizes. Based on these constants alone, it makes sense to make your learners your main teaching resource. They are unlikely to disappear anytime soon, they cost 7you nothing, most of them are delivered to your door every morning and their brains are endlessly flexible.

This book is about doing just that: turning each and every learner, regardless of their religious, ethnic or socio-economic background, into a resource – to themselves, to you, to their peers, to their school, to their families, to their local community and to the world at large.

Cooperative Learning sets a stage that can help each learner become a competent and empathic individual, capable of making sound choices and with the natural potential to develop throughout life. And, of crucial importance for your institution, this successful life will be launched with good SATs and GCSE grades. This book is a practical guide on how to achieve this in your classroom and your school, based on our own experiences in various settings.

Why pick some when you can just have it all?

For all intents and purposes, the vision of the current school system is restricted to test scores, with a functional human being as a wholly accidental – and rare – by-product. In the largest (pre-COVID) health survey ever conducted on UK university students, one third reported having a ‘serious personal, emotional, behavioural or mental health problem for which they felt they needed professional help’. More than 80% of these students reported that their symptoms began in secondary school.9 In direct opposition to this, for most colleagues we have met, the vision is for happy and well-rounded human beings, with tests as a necessary evil which often just get in the way.

From the perspective of the traditional caricature, the political right wants authoritarian schools to produce quality assured machine parts which will serve to strengthen the national economy, whereas those on the political left are accused of wanting hippie heads to nurture happy and incompetent drifters whose sole ambition is ‘exploring themselves’ while cashing in on Universal Credit. (Although in these blurred times, no one quite knows their left from their right.)

8Cooperative Learning negates the entire progressive vs. traditional dichotomy. In a Cooperative Learning classroom, the teacher is an authority who is responsible for teaching, setting the next learning path, structuring schemata and matching the learning to the needs of the learners. The learners, on the other hand, are responsible for learning – yielding confident, competent human beings with good test results in all phases. In the true spirit of collaboration, why not let everyone win, left and right?

Why it’s not business as usual

The classic perception of businesses wanting docile factory fodder is no longer quite fair. Most of today’s corporations hold the belief that schools should teach the most relevant and universally applicable skills, which reflect the demands of our complex, competitive, knowledge-based, technology-driven economy and society. This is why organisations such as Partnership for 21st Century Skills include brand names such as the Ford Motor Company, Microsoft and Lego.10

These sought-after skills include civic literacy, social justice awareness, ethical literacy, global and multicultural literacy and humanitarianism (to name but a few), and their promotion is mainly motivated by a belief that they will have significant consequences for our economy, democracy and society.11 Try tick-box testing that.

Employers have also called for the need to ensure that students develop effective communication skills, and the ability to talk for persuasive purposes has been linked to effective participation in civic and social life.

Bronwen Maxwell, Cathy Burnett, John Reidy, Ben Willis and Sean Demack,Oracy Curriculum, Culture and Assessment Toolkit12

9We assume that no one in business or government wants the national economy to fail or for youngsters to be jobless and disenfranchised. However, due to its age and size, the education system carries an incredible momentum and therefore the hope is always that (since it is impractical to tear it down and rebuild it from scratch) it can be somehow gradually upgraded. After all, what sane career politician would want to demolish an old factory and replace it with a garden if its fruits would be harvested outside of his tenure and may not even be quantifiable in any sense of the word?

Cooperative Learning presents a bottom-up solution to all the systemic issues that governments have neither the motive nor the means to address. It allows an educational paradigm shift to take place, one school at a time, without rocking the institutional supertanker. Is the purpose of education to get learners to pass a test? Is it to serve business and fuel the economy? Is it for young people to lead rich and fulfilling lives? With Cooperative Learning there is no need to choose.

1 J. Dicken, The Cost of Lockdown: Attainment Gap Widens By Up to 52% for Primary Pupils, Schools Week (24 July 2020). Available at: https://schoolsweek.co.uk/the-cost-of-lockdown-attainment-gap-widens-by-up-to-52-for-primary-pupils.

2 G. Di Pietro, F. Biagi, P. Costa, Z. Karpiński and J. Mazza, The Likely Impact of COVID-19 on Education: Reflections Based on the Existing Literature and Recent International Datasets (Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union, 2020), p. 29. Available at: https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/bitstream/JRC121071/jrc121071.pdf.

3 Ofsted, Children Hardest Hit By COVID-19 Pandemic Are Regressing in Basic Skills and Learning (10 November 2020) [press release]. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/ofsted-children-hardest-hit-by-covid-19-pandemic-are-regressing-in-basic-skills-and-learning.

4 Find out more in this short video interview with Professor Lee Marsden at the University of East Anglia: J. Werdelin, Tertiary in the 21st Century: A Cooperative Learning Toolkit (2015). Available at: https://videos.werdelin.co.uk/#collection/13.

5 B. Rosenshine, Principles of Instruction: Research-Based Strategies That All Teachers Should Know, American Educator (spring 2012), 12–19, 39. Available at: https://www.aft.org/sites/default/files/periodicals/Rosenshine.pdf.

6 See, for example, S. Allison and A. Tharby, Making Every Lesson Count: Six Principles to Support Great Teaching and Learning (Carmarthen: Crown House Publishing, 2015). To date, there are nine titles in this series.

7 T. Sherrington, Rosenshine’s Principles in Action (Woodbridge: John Catt Educational, 2019).

8 These are also available to print directly from the internet in a public folder at: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1aqfQGiV7VLEMF2NoivlwtUdk1Xe-0uu2 (https://bit.ly/TheBeginnersGuideDownloads).

9 Rethink, Largest Survey of Its Kind Reveals Extent of University Students’ Struggles with Thoughts of Self-Harm, Loneliness and Anxiety (5 March 2019). Available at: https://www.rethink.org/news-and-stories/news/2019/mar/largest-survey-of-its-kind-reveals-extent-of-university-students-struggles-with-thoughts-of-self-harm-loneliness-and-anxiety.

10 C. Fadel, 21st Century Skills: How Can You Prepare Students for the New Global Economy? (Paris: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development/Centre for Educational Research and Innovation, 2008). Available at: https://www.oecd.org/site/educeri21st/40756908.pdf. See also https://www.battelleforkids.org/networks/p21.

11 Glossary of Education Reform, 21st Century Skills (25 August 2016). Available at: https://www.edglossary.org/21st-century-skills.

12 B. Maxwell, C. Burnett, J. Reidy, B. Willis and S. Demack, Oracy Curriculum, Culture and Assessment Toolkit: Evaluation Report and Executive Summary (London: Education Endowment Foundation, 2015), p. 7. Available at: http://shura.shu.ac.uk/10828/1/EEF%20Oracy%20School_21.pdf.

11

Chapter 1

What is Cooperative Learning? (And Especially What It Isn’t)

It’s the early 1980s in a suburb north of Copenhagen. Jakob is in the Danish equivalent of Year 6. He is sitting with five other children around a table: Madeline and Maria are discussing boys and trying out different types of make-up; Martin is throwing balls of crumpled paper at other groups of children, conveying messages that would be obscene if only he could spell; Andreas is reading a comic book; Jenny, who suffers from undiagnosed Asperger’s, is quietly solving the task; Jakob is drawing a knight fighting a dragon in the margin of his textbook. When the bell rings, they all sign their names on Jenny’s paper and the clueless teacher compliments them on their ‘collaborative skills’.

So, first a definition: the Education Endowment Foundation describes collaborative learning as an approach which ‘involves pupils working together on activities or learning tasks in a group small enough for everyone to participate on a collective task that has been clearly assigned. Pupils in the group may work on separate tasks contributing to a common overall outcome, or work together on a shared task.’1

Note:Cooperative Learning and collaborative learning are used interchangeably in the Education Endowment Foundation’s Teaching and Learning Toolkit to describe structured shared activities.

Collaborative or Cooperative Learning (used interchangeably in the Teaching and Learning Toolkit, but from this point on we will use Cooperative) is a term that refers to a number of such activities, which can stimulate thought and conversation about a given subject. The range and scope of said thoughts and conversations can (to a sufficient degree) be controlled, which means that Cooperative Learning can facilitate the full 12taxonomy spectrum from simple memorisation to analysis, debating and creating. The activities have simple steps that do not overwhelm learners; indeed, they help to focus minds on what needs to be learned.

The Education Endowment Foundation continue: ‘Effective collaborative learning requires much more than just sitting pupils together and asking them to work in a group.’ Or to put it even more directly: ‘simple steps which focus discussion in an activity’.2 This is the form of Cooperative Learning presented in this book: it pre-organises peer interaction into reusable patterns, which we have dubbed CLIPs. CLIP is an acronym for:

CooperativeLearningInteractionPattern

It is a pattern, in the sense that, again and again, it sequences your learners’ interaction with your materials/tasks/questions and with each other, regardless of what or whom these might be in a given activity in a given lesson. But it’s not just any interaction pattern; it’s specifically a Cooperative Learning Interaction Pattern. Now, there are a number of definitions of what is required for a sequence of interactions to warrant the designation ‘Cooperative Learning’ as opposed to ‘group work’. Here, we have chosen the leanest delineation by American educator Spencer Kagan, who first coined the mnemonic PIES.3 PIES is an acronym for:

Positive interdependenceIndividual accountabilityEqual participationSimultaneous interaction

This sounds a lot, but it is not,4 because these four principles are always facilitated by the very pattern itself – no planning is required to achieve PIES.

13Let’s investigate how PIES is facilitated using a CLIP called Catch1Partner, which is the centrepiece of this book. In the most basic form of Catch1Partner, each learner has a subject-relevant question on a card which they discuss in changing pairs (see Figure 2.1 for a step-by-step description).

Note: Please do not over-focus on ‘questions on cards’. These are just one example of many possible materials. As we will discuss in detail in Chapter 2, any physical object can be connected to any question across any subject – for example: worksheets (What do you have for question 3?), Numicons (Can you count out this for me?), photos (Was kannst du sehen?), graphs (What are the coordinates of this point?), rocks (How can you tell whether this is flint or not?) and so on.

Positive interdependence means that both children in each pair are needed to perform the CLIP and therefore both stand to benefit from their peer’s successful outcome. They are not fighting for their teacher’s attention, and nor are they competing to come up with the right answer first or even for their right to speak. On the contrary, the more one partner succeeds at his task, the more the other partner stands to benefit in the form of learning, and vice versa. This mutual reliance is embedded in all steps of the interaction. As children approach a potential partner, they might be requested to use phrases modelled by the teacher (in bold) – for example, ‘Excuse me, can I ask you a question, please?’ ‘Yes, of course you may’ (smile, turn full body towards peer, establish eye contact, appropriate physical distance and voice volume – all modelled by the teacher). They take it in turns to answer each other’s questions/solve each other’s tasks and then swap cards and say, ‘Thank you.’

Usually (please be aware of the ‘usually’ here), this activity is used to remind children about something that has been taught previously (known in the current zeitgeist as ‘activating prior knowledge’ or ‘revision’). However, all CLIPs can be used at any time and/or in any situation to facilitate many different objectives across a wide range of subjects – and social skills are not to be scoffed at. In the bigger scheme of things, an 80-year longitudinal study from Harvard reveals that the most essential quality in a good life is having good human 14relationships.5 Other research notes that praise and positivity are social rewards,6 and that social reward appears to use similar subcortical regions of the brain’s reward system as receiving money.7 The social element in these activities ties the process of learning to the stimulation of the brain’s pleasure responses, which many children today find mainly in addictive games and social media.

The second aspect that defines Cooperative Learning, individual accountability, is the demand that both partners answer (how to ensure that they can answer and how to monitor this will be addressed throughout the book) and can do so using their own ideas and from their own unique understanding. A recent study showed increases in reward system activity during the answering of educational questions in conditions that favoured engagement and educational learning.8

Equal participation entails that both partners not only answer, but they have the same opportunity to speak from their own understanding and at their own length about the subject matter, irrespective of their different abilities. A key feature here is that lower-attaining children are just as important to the resolution of the CLIP steps as their higher-attaining peers. Indeed, the inclusion automatically afforded by Cooperative Learning is one of its many unique selling points. Obviously, some will talk for longer than others, but time is limited to the interaction of asking and answering the specific question, so at some point invariably they will both have answered, then swap materials and move on to the next partner. The truth is that verbose responses are the least of your problems; you will generally find yourself working to extend these conversations – which is where oracy gels into Cooperative Learning with a vengeance.

Finally, simultaneous interaction demands that everyone is doing all this at the same time – every single learner. There is no exception to this rule unless there are very specific special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) related reasons, and even so, any concessions should be temporary. For example, permission for an anxious child to remain in a corner and let people come to him should be seen as a step towards gathering the 15courage to mingle. Should you need reminding, you will find the PIES acronym explained in Appendix E.

Summary: For a classroom activity to warrant the noble label ‘Cooperative Learning’ it must pre-organise learner interactions into simple steps which combine to secure positive interdependence, individual accountability, equal participation and simultaneous interaction. If it does not, it is termed ‘group work’ – and the authors of this book wash their hands and then apply a good deal of sanitiser to boot.

Why is it so important to delineate Cooperative Learning?

An anecdote serves to answer this question. Some years ago, after much ado, Jakob finally got the opportunity to present Cooperative Learning to the leadership of a certain large primary school. He’d had this particular school in his sights for quite some time, having understood that the head teacher was decisive, open-minded, skilled and 100% dedicated to improving the lives of her children – basically, ready to take on Cooperative Learning. Full of confidence, Jakob arrived and did his song and dance; he explained the cost-efficiency, the benefits to teachers and children, the impact on the school’s development targets and unique ethos, gave practical examples of activities, drew connections to the Sutton Trust’s research on the pupil premium and even showed a short video. A few days later, he was informed by email that the school had zero interest – in a polite, roundabout British way, of course.

At the time of writing, that very same school is involved in a county-wide project where Jakob is responsible for the Cooperative Learning element. Its project leads, teachers and children are over the moon about the very activities he described in that original meeting. He was later given to understand that his presentation had been written off because the leadership felt they were already doing ‘enough group work and talk partners’.

You might argue that talk partners is an interaction pattern, and on a very basic level it does appear to have some similarities. However, it does not support the equal participation required to meet the lofty standards of Cooperative Learning. Often, the voice of the 16loudest becomes the only voice heard. Moreover, the purpose of a real CLIP is to verbalise a thought process and not talk for the sake of talking. All opinions are not equal; some are a great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in terms of factual knowledge, logic and argument. But often those with good reasoning and understanding don’t get their voices heard in the classroom. The equal participation enforced by CLIPs is a way of giving those thought processes a chance to be heard. Similarly, you will see that for the same reasons, talk partners does not secure individual accountability – much to the pleasure of any learner who yields the spotlight to their verbose mate because they cannot be bothered to engage in the learning.

The moral of this tale is that in order to understand what Cooperative Learning is, we must first define what it is not. As we’ve pointed out, Cooperative Learning is not group work or talk partners, and you will get the most out of this book if you work from this premise.

Cooperative Learning is not new. Let’s pick an example of a CLIP from your halcyon PGCE days, from whence you will remember Think-Pair-Share. This classic CLIP, formalised by Frank Lyman back in 1981, is composed of three steps, think, pair and share.9 Simply add a task, model and monitor, and – like all other CLIPs – Think-Pair-Share will work instantly in any subject and with any age group: ‘What would you have done if you were a police officer and found Goldilocks breaking into the three bears’ house?’ ‘Explain how you would solve this word problem from last year’s SAT paper.’ ‘Summarise the impact of neoliberalism on the UK economy in the 2000s.’ Think of a CLIP as a delivery tool (see Figure 1.1).

Think-Pair-Share is just one out of hundreds of CLIPs, many of which are used regularly by teachers all over the world without necessarily being called a Cooperative Learning Interaction Pattern or even Cooperative Learning. As one delegate said to Jakob after a training session: ‘This is actually just really good teaching practice, isn’t it?’

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Figure 1.1. Some teachers find it helpful to think of a CLIP as a delivery tool, in the same way that the same type of syringe may be used again and again to administer different medicines. Different activities with different objectives occur when your content changes. The steps in the CLIP, on the other hand, are immutable. You wouldn’t throw out the plunger and think your syringe would still work. In the same way, you don’t dump the ‘pair’ step in Think-Pair-Share.

The bigger picture