Collaborative Learning

In each session, I learned in a collaborative environment whatever it was computer mediated or face-to-face interaction. More importantly, it has special meaning for me. Not only did I learn about the subject knowledge, but also I changed the way of thinking.

Collaborative learning will be reflected from three aspects: the definition, its advantage and my learning experience. Finally, it will be concluded briefly by discussing the implication.

Definition
Literature about collaborative learning is accumulating significantly. But there is little clear definition. One of the broadest definitions of “collaboration learning” is that it is a situation in which two or more people attempt to learn something together. Three elements of the definition have been further explained. “Two or more people” may consider as a pair, a small group just like 3 to 5 students in my course. “To learn something” may be interpreted as following a course, learning from lifelong work practice. Lastly “together” means different forms of interaction (Pierre 1999).

In this course, we conducted face-to-face or computer-mediated discussion, videoconference and joint presentation.

Advantage of collaborative learning

According to David et al. (1998), collaborative learning has been greatly conducted since the 1960s. There 305 studies have been found on comparing three different learning styles, i.e. collaborative, competitive and individualistically learning. Comparison among them has been made to reach the following three points.

1) In academic tasks including knowledge acquisition, retention, accuracy, creativity in problem solving and higher-level reasoning, students can achieve much higher score when learning cooperatively rather than competitively or individualistically.
2) Regarding quality of relationships, it has been proved that cooperative effort promotes greater liking among students. In other words, students promoted by cooperative learning can deal with interpersonal relationship better within different ethnics, culture, language, and social class.
3) In reviewing the research, it has been found that members of cooperative groups have higher self-esteem and better social skills, feeling healthier psychologically than students working competitively or individualistically.

However conducting collaborative learning is not always easy and fruitful, sometimes the outcome is often found chaotic. Some of students argued, “I paid to hear you, not my classmates!” and some resist changes in instruction and force faculty to continue to lecture.

Reflection based on learning experience in this course

To understand how the collaborative learning works remarkably for me, I summarize the following reflective points from my learning experience.

1) Self-direction
The major impression I gained from collaborative learning was the feature of self-direction in the study. Before we carried out an online discussion, we were required to do much background reading related with the task. We always got opportunity to choose the topic we like, the depth that we want to dig. It helped the students to develop self-interested, self-decision, and autonomy learning. It emphasized that the process of learning was enjoyable or important for its own sake. With too much intervention or instruction from teacher, learning will become arbitrary and irrelevant exercises to please the others or to reach high grades (Good and Brophy, 1994).

2) Reflective learning
In each session, we often needed to exchange ideas and to contribute opinion to the group task. In order to do that, the members in collaborative learning needed to actively engage in background reading and to reflect their well-prepared learning materials to the other students in the team for collaboratively completing the group task. All members were required not only focus on their own studying, but also willing to reveal their knowledge to the group.

3) Critical thinking
During preparing learning materials and debating, we often automatically analysed, compared, persuaded, and offered feedback, and finally we needed to integrate our own work into the group tasks. The members were expected to be sensitive to the different perspective, to discover the various ways of thinking. Critical thinking would be developed by solving the problem objectively and exploring things from different perceptive.

4) The group identity established
As a member in collaborative learning, I gradually increased awareness of the group image. In collaborative learning environment, a supportive member is often more important than a strong-minded member. From Alexander’s point view (1987), “the most important thing about collaborative learning is that it facilitates the development of teamwork skills and encourages the individual student to view each classmate as a potential helper rather than as a competitor. Students learn to work together toward common goals.”

In collaborative learning, members need to perform a task together or sometimes need to be able to share the work, or teach each other (Louise and Lan 1993). We debated, negotiated, and solved the conflicts in the group work. We also shared individual efforts, and worked together on a joint project. During the lengthy process, the students would develop a good listening skill, basic social skills and eventually establish the group identity. I believe that it will help me to cope with the occupational demands when I go to a workplace.

Last but not least, the assessment of collaborative learning can be in very various forms, but the purpose of doing this is to exam students’ efforts in learning process and ability to work with the others. Habeshaw et al. (1993) and Gibbs (1995) provide us a considerable details on allocate grades, collectively, individually by negotiation or a combination of assessment methods.
Conclusion

In my past learning experience, there was a popular saying to descript the situation of teaching and learning, “test, test, test is a treasure for teacher; score, score, score is the fate of students”. Considering collaborative learning in the future implication, to conduct collaborative learning with myself like to move Mountain Himalayas, but just as Alexander (1987) suggested, I can examine the way I teach my classes, treat my students, and treat my colleagues. I will take my initiative to introduce this valuable method in conferences, teaching planning, and all kinds of group activities.

Reference:
[1]. Astin W. A. (1987). Competition or Cooperation?: Teaching Teamwork as a Basic Skill in Deborah DeZure (eds. 2000) Learning from change: Landmarks in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education from Change Magazine 1969-1999, London: Kogan Page Ltd. (P. 182-186 )
[2]. Dillenbourg Pierre, 1999, advances in learning and instruction series: Collaborative Learning Cognitive and Computational Approaches, Oxford, Elsevier Science Ltd.
[3]. Gibbs G. (1995) Assessing Student Centred Courses, Oxford Centre for Staff Development, Oxford, Oxford Brooks University
[4]. Good. L. T. and Brophy E. J. (6th edit. 1994) Looking in Classroom, New York, Harper Collins College Publishers
[5]. Habeshaw, S. Gibbs, G. and Habeshaw, T. (1993) 53 Interesting ways to Asses Your Students, Bristol, Technical and Educational Services Ltd.
[6]. Johnson W. D. and Johnson T. R. and Smith A. K. (1998). Cooperative Learning Returns to College in Deborah DeZure (eds. 2000) Learning from Change: Landmarks in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education from Change Magazine 1969-1999, London: Kogan Page Ltd. (P. 205-212)
[7]. Moran L. and Mugridge L. (1993) Collaboration in Distance Education: International Case Study, London, Routledge
[8]. Morgan C. and O’reilly M. (1999). Assessing Open and Distance Learners. London: Kogan Page Lit.