Promoting Functional Literacy through Cooperative Learning

Abstract

The effects of cooperative learning strategy manipulations on the enactment and recall of a medical procedure were explored. One hundred and twenty-three college students completed the experiment. During training, participants were randomly assigned to a dyad in one of four conditions: (a) no-strategy, (b) baseline strategy, (c) prompting strategy, and (d) planning strategy. During testing, participants both performed and produced written recalls of the procedure instructions. Test order was counterbalanced within dyad. Training and test performances were videotaped. The planning group produced the best recalls and recalled more conditions of the procedure. The prompting group performed best. Recall of the procedure in all groups was enhanced by prior performance. However, performance was enhanced by prior recall in only two groups. The groups differed also in the nature of the transition from training to testing. Theoretical and applied implications of these findings are discussed.The present experiment explored the efficacy of a variety of cooperative strategies in promoting functional literacy. Functional literacy, as used here, may be defined as the kind of literacy which is demonstrated when a person reads a set of 339

Unstructured Collaboration Versus Individual Practice for Complex Problem Solving: A Cautionary Tale

“…Investigations with college students reported by Dansereau and his colleagues (e.g., O'Donnell et al, 1986;O'Donnell et al, 1988aO'Donnell et al, , 1988b and by Fantuzzo and his colleagues (e.g., Fantuzzo, Dimeff, & Fox, 1989;Fantuzzo, Riggio, et al, 1989) are a notable exception to the lack of experimental control. These investigations incorporated strong experimental designs, and although they were of short duration, often less than 3 hr, they showed strong effects in favor of collaborative learning.…”

“…Dansereau and colleagues (e.g., Dansereau, 1988) successfully demonstrated the efficacy of collaboration to facilitate text-based learning when dyads were provided with scripted interactions and prescribed peer roles. Subsequent investigations using the same procedural approach with larger groupings of students in the collaborative exchange failed to demonstrate similar achievement gains (e.g., O'Donnell et al, 1986;O'Donnell et al, 1988aO'Donnell et al, , 1988b.…”

Learning concrete procedures: Effects of processing strategies and cooperative learning.

“…It should be remembered that all of the groups involved in this experiment were directed to learn both sets of information. Previous research (O'Donnell, Dansereau, Rocklin, et al, 1988) indicated that participants who "prompt" themselves as they learn about a procedure tend to focus on the performance component of the task. The present results appear to be consistent with that general tendency, in that participants in the simultaneous group, who were allowed to solicit information from the equipment passage as needed, appeared to focus on the performance/procedural information.…”

“…The participants in this experiment were required to learn how to set up and start an intravenous infusion (IV). This procedure has been used in a number of previous experiments (e.g., O'Donnell, Dansereau, Rocklin, et al, 1988). In this experiment, the complexity of the procedure was increased by including more "choice points" at which the participant had to select the correct piece of equipment in order to complete the procedure.…”

“…Previous research has shown that when participants do not plan the procedure, achievement on declarative knowledge measures is decreased. In addition, when participants are not allowed to prompt themselves as they progress through the task, performance on the initial procedural enactment and on subsequent retention of the procedure is decreased (O’Donnell, Dansereau, Rocklin, et al, 1988). Thus, it appears that both components are necessary in order to maximize outcomes on a variety of measures.…”