EFFECT OF COLLABORATIVE LEARNING APPROACH ON THE STUDENTS’ LEARNING

An Undergraduate Thesis Presented to the College of EducationCOTABATO FOUNDATION COLLEGE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Doroluman, Arakan, Cotabato

In partial fulfillment of Requirements for the DegreeBACHELOR OF ELEMENTARY EDUCATION

REGINE JOY V. ARACAP2016

CHAPTER I

THE PROBLEM

Introduction

Collaboration has become a twenty-first-century trend. The concept of

collaborative learning is the grouping and pairing of students for the purpose of

achieving an academic goal, has been widely researched and advocated throughout the

professional literature (Johnson & Johnson, i 992, Slavin, 1995, Gokhale, 1995). The

term "collaborative learning" refers to an instruction method in which students at various

performance levels work together in small groups toward a common goal. The students

are responsible for one another's learning as well as their own. Thus, the success of

one student helps other students to be successful.

In recent years, there are many teaching and learning approaches that have

been used by the teachers to provide a quality education. When teachers brought their

classes into the room, students worked individually on lessons for one or double

periods. In such learning environment, learning may not fit in individual needs; it also

created problems such as increasing anxiety, hostility, and boredom of students.

Students are generally isolated from one another in the learning setting. The student

was discouraged from sharing information or providing assistance to and by other

students.

The above problems caused in a teacher centered classroom could be alleviated

by collaborative learning. Collaborative leaning is a combination of instructional

strategies in which a group of students master their learning through collaborative

efforts. Students work in small. mixed-ability learning teams and draw on each other's

strength and help each other to accomplish a common academic goal. This method

encourages supportive relationships, good communication skills and higher-level

thinking abilities. The rationale for collaborative learning is heterogeneous groups

working towards a common goal with group members responsible for their teammates'

learning and their own learning.

The aims of collaborative learning are to encourage cooperative group

relationships, to develop students' self-esteem, and to increase students' academic

achievements. In traditional school learning, individual students usually study in a

competitive situation. If one succeeds, others will fail.

In collaborative learning, individuals will interact with one another and will

develop group skills such as discussion skills and interpersonal skills in a collaborative

learning situation. Moreover, collaborative learning is a combination of instructional

strategies that encourages student to work together as a team. They share

responsibility in learning for their own team as well as enhancing their face-to-face

interaction and encouraging one another to do well.

In education today, there are interesting collaborative learning strategies that will

enable students to have active control over their own learning and will also enhance

academic achievement (Onabanjo, 2000). According to Slavin (1995) as cited in

Wichadee (2007), collaborative learning is an instructional program in which students

work in small groups to help one another master academic content.

One of the major reasons for this downturn in students’ achievement in the

subject is the non utilization of necessary techniques in teaching. It has therefore

become necessary to seek effort that will employ a collaborative approach or

approaches that will enhance better academic learning of students.

Statement of the Problem

The study attempted to determine the effect collaborative approach to the

student learning.

It aimed to answer the following questions:

1. What are the collaborative learning approaches used by the teachers on the

College of Education?

2. What is the frequency of the collaborative learning strategies used in the class?

3. What is the level of academic learning with collaborative learning approach as

perceived by the respondents?

4. Is there any significant relationship between the frequency on the use of

collaborative learning strategy and the level of academic learning?

Significance of the Study

The success of this study will give the readers an idea on the effect of

collaborative learning approach on the students learning. Teachers will benefit in this

study because it will help them identify what type of collaborative learning approach is

effective to improve the students learning.

Scope and Limitation of the Study

This study was limited to the effect of collaborative learning approach on the

second year BEEd students of the College of Education, school year 2016-2017.

CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

Learning under cooperative goal structure, strengths of each person are utilized.

Savin (1985) described cooperative learning strategies as "structured, systematic

instructional strategies capable of being used at any grade level and in most school

subjects. Each group is a microcosm of the class in achievement level, sex, and

ethnicity'. The students' work in mixed-ability groups are rewarded on the basis of the

success of the whole group, based on a cooperative goal structure (Slavin, 1990). In

recent years, research on collaborative learning is currently a very popular topic in

education, psychology and science. Educational research has attempted to determine

under what circumstances collaborative learning is more effective than learning alone,

and more recently, numerous studies have focused 4 ori the integration of collaborative

learning with learning activities such as learning with instruction delivered using

integrated learning system (Brush, i 997), learning with a computer simulation (Klein

and Doran, 1 999) and learning with computer-based instruction (Cavalier and Klein,

1998).

One of the major reasons for this downturn in students’ achievement in the

subject is the non utilization of necessary techniques in teaching. It has therefore

become necessary to seek effort that will employ an approach or approaches that will

enhance better academic performance of students in that aspect.

In the CL environment, the learners are challenged both socially and emotionally

as they listen to different perspectives, and are required to articulate and defend their

ideas. In so doing, the learners begin to create their own unique conceptual frameworks

and not rely solely on an expert's or a text's framework. In a CL setting, learners have

the opportunity to converse with peers, present and defend ideas, exchange diverse

beliefs, question other conceptual frameworks, and are actively engaged (Srinivas, H.,

2011).

Collaborative learning occurs when small groups of students help each other to

learn. CL is sometimes misunderstood. It is not having students talk to each other,

either face-to-face or in a computer conference, while they do their individual

assignments. It is not having them do the task individually and then have those who

finish first help those who have not yet finished. And it is certainly not having one or a

few students do all the work, while the others append their names to the report (Klemm,

W.R., 1994.

The literature review discussing collaborative learning often references the

precepts of social constructivism. Dillenbourg (1999:1) broadly defines collaborative

learning as “a situation in which two or more people learn or attempt to learn something

together”: Collaborative learning is a situation in which two or more people learn or

attempt to learn something together (Bruffee, 1993). Johnson & Johnson (1999)

proposed positive interdependence, individual accountability, face to face interaction,

social skills and group processing as the five basic elements of collaborative learning,

and the grouping strategies were essential to meet the needs of the five basic elements.

Dillenbourg, Baker, Blaye, & O’Malley (1996) suggested that heterogeneous groups

could be beneficial as a condition to trigger conflicts and require negotiation and social

grounding, in addition, Setlock, Fussell, & Neuworth (2004) suggested that experimental

groups with homogenous and heterogeneous cultural backgrounds had different

perceptions of the study task. With respect to this importance, the rules for grouping

such as heterogeneity in a group and homogeneity between groups were decided in

terms of students’ features such as gender, age, learning style, knowledge base, and

cultural background.

Collaborative or cooperative learning differs from traditional learning because it

provides structural opportunities for individuals, who are given specific roles within their

groups, to work together to reach common goals. It is usually contrasted with traditional

or competitive classroom environments (Kessler, 2003). When students learn

separately, their individual performances do not necessarily affect one another either

positively or negatively. Competitive learning, on the other hand, means putting them in

direct competition with each other, with the idea that this will have an effect on individual

performances (Albesher, 2012).

Collaboration is sometimes distinguished from cooperative learning in that

cooperation is typically accomplished through the division of labor, with each person

responsible for some portion of the problem solving. Collaboration, on the other hand,

involves participants working together on the same task, rather than in parallel on

separate portions of the task (Lai, 2011).

Collaborative learning entails not only the division of work in a specific task, but it

requires its joint completion so that the team members can construct meanings together

and can develop cultural and professional knowledge (Barros, 2011). It means that

students are responsible for one another's learning as well as their own and that

reaching the goal implies that students have helped each other to understand and learn

(Dooly, 2008).

Collaborative interactions are characterized by shared goals, symmetry of

structure, and a high degree of negotiation, interactivity, and interdependence.

Interactions producing elaborated explanations are particularly valuable for improving

student learning (Lai, 2011).

There are several qualities that characterize truly collaborative interactions. First,

collaboration is characterized by a relatively symmetrical structure, however that

symmetry is accomplished. For example, in situations with symmetry of action, each

participant has access to the same range of actions. This contrasts with the typical

division of labor in cooperative learning structures; partners split up the work, solve sub-

tasks individually, and then put their respective contributions together. Symmetry of

knowledge occurs when all participants have roughly the same level of knowledge,

although they may have difference perspectives. Symmetry of status involves

collaboration among peers rather than interactions involving supervisor/subordinate

relationships. Finally, symmetry of goals involves common group goals rather than

individual goals that may conflict (Dillenbourg, 1999).

Another type of collaborative learning frequently used at the post-secondary level

of education is problem-based learning (Savery, 2006), which, also asks students to

tackle large, usually open-ended problems, often in a specific content-area or discipline

such as medicine or business. Nevertheless, implementing collaborative learning

strategies in the classroom does not appear to necessarily ensure either student

engagement or achievement of learning objectives (Summers & Volet, 2010). CL

provides the teacher with many opportunities to observe students interacting, explaining

their reasoning, asking questions and discussing their ideas and concepts (Cooper, et

al., 1984). These are far more inclusive assessment methods than relying on written

exams only (Cross, K.P. & Angelo, T.A., 1993).

Students Learning

Independent Variable Dependent Variable

Collaborative Learning Approach

Conceptual Framework

As intended, the researcher will identify the collaborative learning approaches.

The collaborative learning approaches were ranked and the relationships with the

teachers were also compared.

Two main variables were used in the research. One is the dependent variable,

which are the students learning and the collaborative learning approach as the

independent variables.

Research Paradigm

Null Hypothesis

There is no significant relationship between the frequency on the use of

collaborative learning strategy and the level of academic learning.

Definition of Terms

Collaborative Learning – the grouping of students in the class

Approach – a method

Students – respondents of the study

Learning – acquiring of knowledge

Acronyms

BEEd – Bachelor in Elementary Education

CL – Collaborative Learning

CFCST – Cotabato Foundation College of Science and Technology

Chapter III

METHODOLOGY

This chapter describes the methods and procedure of searching and analyzing

the data in the study. It includes the research design, locale of the study, and

respondents of the study, instrument sampling procedure, data gathering techniques

and statistical analysis of the collected data.

Research Design

This study uses the descriptive survey method. The purpose of this design was

to determine the effect of collaborative learning approach to the student learning.

Locale of the Study

This study will be conducted on the Cotabato Foundation College of Science and

Technology, Doroluman, Arakan, North Cotabato specifically in the College of

Education academic year 2016-2017.

Respondents of the Study

The respondents of the study were second year BEEd students of the College of

Education of the Cotabato Foundation College of Science and Technology, Doroluman,

Arakan, Cotabato academic year 2016-2017. The sampling procedure to be used in

this study is the random sampling.

Research Instrument

The data were gathered using a questionnaire made by the researcher. The

questionnaire was divided into three parts; collaborative learning approach, academic

learning, and use of collaborative learning strategies.

The study makes use of the following scale.

Rating Scale

3 – Always

2 – Sometimes

1 – Never

Data Gathering

To facilitate the conduct of the study, permission was sought first from the

Department Dean. Likewise, the permission to administer the questionnaire was sought

from the Department Dean of the CFCST College of Education. The questionnaire was

distributed by the researcher to the respondents and they are given enough time to

answer the questions

Statistical Treatment

The statistical treatment will be determined by the resident statistician.

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Effect of Collaborative Learning Approach on the Students Learning

Research Questionnaire

Name: __________________________ (optional) Date: _________Year/Section: ___________________

Direction: Kindly read the questionnaire and check your response on the corresponding rating scale.

Rating Scale

3 – Always

2 – Sometimes

1 – Never

A. Collaborative Learning Approach 1 2 3

1. The teacher groups us to solve mathematical problems.

2. The teacher groups us to dramatize a certain situation.

3. The teacher groups us to perform dance, song, etc.

4. The teacher groups us to investigate a phenomenon.

5. The teacher groups us to report a topic.

B. Academic Learning

1. I learn best when I collaborate with my classmates.

2. I understand the lesson when it has group activity rather than pure discussion.

3. I gather more ideas when we work as a group compared to individual activities.

4. I can perform well in class when I have companies.

5. I am more confident to present my ideas to the class when I present it with my group mates.

6. Working with other students in class gives me more opportunities to learn new ideas.

C. Use of Collaborative Learning Strategies

1. The teacher gives a group activity every meeting.

2. The teacher gives activity when the lesson requires it.

3. The teacher groups the class during reporting.

4. During investigation/experimentation the class is grouped and collaborate ideas.

5. The class is grouped by the teacher to perform drama, song, a nd dance.