The Impact of a Cooperative Learning Program on the Academ-ic Achievement in Mathematics and Language in Fourth Grade Students and its Relation to Cognitive Style

Abstract

This study is expected to determine the impact of a program based on the cooperative learning methodology. This, in comparison to a traditional learning situation in both mathematics and language achievement. The study was carried out on a group of fourth grade students of primary school. In addition, it tried to find the differential impact according to the cognitive style in the field dependence-independence dimension. This work was carried out with 76 students of the Colegio José Martí I.E.D. (Bogotá-Colombia) ranging from 8-12 years of age. The control group received a traditional teaching methodology and the experimental group received the cooperative learning program, composed of 35 sessions (from July to November 2009). All the participants were tested in mathematics and language performance, before and after the intervention. All of them were tested in cognitive style as well. The results suggested that the cooperative learning methodology benefited importantly the academic achievement of the students in mathematics in contrast to the competitive and individualist situations. The results also suggested that the three cognitive style groups were positively affected from the cooperative learning situation. These results were not found in the language area.

Academic achievement with cooperative learning using homogeneous and heterogeneous groups

“…Both groups, however, made significant gains; however, indicating the grouping did not have a significant impact on the difference in posttest scores for the two groups. This finding supports the majority of research on cooperative learning being a viable teaching strategy (Baer, 2003;Igel & Urquhart, 2012;Smith et al, 2014;Valdez et al, 2015;Vega & Hederich, 2015;Zakaria et al, 2013;Zamani, 2016). This research, however, contradicts the findings from Baer (2003),Van der Smith and Spindle (2007), and Zamani (2016) that all found that grouping techniques did make a significant impact on student achievement.…”

A Scoping Review of Different Ways of Thinking in Children

“…Field-dependent students displayed the highest gain in mathematics and language achievement tests. More recently, a study employed the same methodology but reported different results [60]. The authors reported that co-operative learning increased post-test results in mathematics, irrespective of whether students had a preference for working independently (field-independent style) or in groups (field-dependent style).…”

“…However, in the language domain, co-operative learning was only effective for individuals who identified a preference for working independently (field-independent). In summary, the studies present mixed results on whether the teaching practices should aim to match student’s learning style [58,59,60]. Moreover, because there is a focus on the environment and teaching practices, these studies speak less about how differences are manifested in children’s thinking.…”

“…Whilst some preferences for learning and thinking were identified by some studies [53,56,57], there appeared to be little consensus between them. It was also difficult to conclusively determine the effect of these individual differences on student’s academic achievement [58,59,60]. A major drawback from the research identified is the fact there is little consensus on the models employed, so studies relied on varying theoretical perspectives and captured different constructs.…”

“…In summary, the eight papers employed six different models, with little reasoning or explanation provided for why each model was chosen. Some argued for choice on the ground of “most studied” or “popular” [60,61,62] and provide little reference to the psychometric properties of the model employed (or the potential psychometric flaws in most cases). It is evident that there is considerable similarity between the models within each conceptualisation.…”