6 Cooperative Learning Strategies to Boost Collaboration in the Classroom

26

The most valuable experiences in a student’s life involve teamwork and collaboration. Whether playing on a winning football team, preparing for a musical performance with the orchestra or choir, or working on a group project that is presented to the class, being able to rely on peers—and making oneself reliable—is a skill that students will use throughout their educational, personal, and professional lives.

How do you develop classroom collaboration skills while focusing on independent learning and growth? Learn how to use cooperative learning strategies at any grade level with a range of low-readiness resources and teaching tools. These collaborative activities may be some of the most memorable for students in the classroom and can be a great foundation for team building and lasting friendships.

What is cooperative learning?

Cooperative learning is an educational environment in which small groups of students work together to achieve success. These students share a common goal (good grades, outstanding performance, or learning from each other) and are typically involved in courses that include both long-term projects and short-term assignments suitable for a group setting.

Cooperative learning moves from a competition-based learning strategy to a scenario where everyone benefits from collaboration. However, in a collaborative learning environment, there is still room for healthy competition between groups or classes! As long as everyone in the group knows how to contribute, a cooperative learning class community can have a positive impact on all participants.

Benefits of cooperative learning

The best cooperative learning strategies reflect a society that works together to serve everyone in the community, allowing individuals to share their skills and knowledge with each other in beneficial ways.

Common benefits of cooperative learning include:

• Improve interpersonal skills
• Be more confident in public speaking
• Individual and group responsibilities
• Better active listening and problem-solving skills
• Positive classroom culture
• Better mastery of core subjects
• better assessment scores
• Schedule social time for your children
• Higher academic confidence and self-esteem
• Friendships Across Different Skill Levels
• Increase leadership and team-building opportunities

Types of cooperative learning

While you may have cooperative learning opportunities throughout the day at any grade level, there are three main types of cooperative learning in elementary, middle, and high school.

• formal collaborative learning Involves a structured learning environment where students play different roles in a long-term project, follow a teaching framework to complete collaborative learning activities, and evaluate their own and each other’s contribution and effectiveness within the group.
• informal collaborative learning Use small groups and informal tasks to identify the importance of working with ad hoc teams. This format is more discussion-based than a formal setting, allowing students to hone speaking and listening skills as they summarize the perspectives of group members to achieve mutual understanding.
• Cooperation base group are standing groups of students who work together throughout the year on short-term, long-term and spontaneous assignments and discussions. Students work in small groups throughout the year and are accountable to each other on projects and daily teaching.

Teachers who implement cooperative learning in their classrooms typically use some form of these three models. They may have standing groups that meet regularly, as well as spontaneous groups to discuss courses and designated groups to complete long-term projects.

Classroom cooperative learning strategies

So, how do you bring this learning style into the classroom? Use innovative collaborative learning activities based on classic collaborative learning strategies, as well as assignments that support the entire process and encourage reflection on the group itself.

1. Set up activity stations to strengthen cooperative learning

For small groups, nothing works better than learning stations! Have students rotate through stations that reinforce collaborative learning strategies and teamwork to complete a series of short projects applicable to any discipline or topic.

In elementary school, activity stations work well once learners can work independently, and in middle school and high school, when you have enough time in class for small groups to do full rotations.

Use sticky notes for collaborative learning activities
Ford Board of Directors
Grade: Grade 3 to Grade 9

With sticky note activities such as ‘Truth or Lie’, ‘Guess My Word’ and ‘Draw a Picture’, this resource provides many opportunities for students of all ages to answer questions and solve problems with their peers.

2. Use think-pair-share to discuss topics quickly

You may have used this collaborative activity without realizing it was an example of cooperative learning. Using an “elbow buddy” (a buddy located near their seat), students first think independently about a topic and then discuss their ideas in a one-on-one conversation. Students then share each other’s ideas with the rest of the class. This strategy works from the first day of kindergarten to the last day of senior grade, especially in classes that love to chat during the transition!

Thinking, pairing and sharing through Ruyi Learning
Author: Ruyi Learning Author: Beckie Lee
Grade: Pre-kindergarten to second grade
Subjects: ELA, Speaking and Listening

It’s never too early to start practicing mind pair sharing in your classroom! This CCSS-aligned activity includes anchor charts, mini-lessons, and teaching strategies to encourage young students to use this important skill when sharing their ideas with peers and the class.

3. Develop collaborative skills through puzzle activities

Jigsaw activities are a popular way to get teams working as equals and sharing information. Each member of the group will travel to a station in class to research or learn about a specific topic and then return to the group to share their findings. Each group now has a complete set of data to use in their projects!

Puzzle activities are used in elementary schools when research techniques are taught, and in middle and high schools when the research material may be too dense for individual students to handle.

Puzzle activity template, collaborative learning note-taking strategy
Author: Tess the Cunning Teacher
Grade: Grade 3 to Grade 5

Help primary school students master the art of collaboration with versatile puzzle activity resources. It includes editable planners, notes pages, and graphic organizers to guide young learners through the process of putting information together.

4. Assign roles to help all students contribute

You’ve heard it over and over: “My team isn’t doing any work!” Prevent unbalanced team efforts and allow everyone to contribute to their assigned team role. Younger children are responsible for assigning tasks and responsibilities, while older students use these roles to evaluate the effectiveness of teamwork.

Group Work Role Cards Expectations Responsible Talk Posters Collaborative Learning
Author: Junior Diary
Grade: 1-5
Subjects: Classroom Community, English Language Arts
Standard: CCSS SL.1.1, 1a, 1b, 1.3; SL.2.1, 1a, 1b; SL.3.1, 1b, 3, SL.4.1, 1b, 1d

Students do better in groups when they have homework to complete. Use this resource with editable slides, role expectations, and sentence stems to improve students’ speaking and listening skills and keep them focused during group activities and projects.

Cooperative Learning-Journal-Role-Grading-Assessment-Bilingual Dual
by creative category abc
Grade: Grade 3 to Grade 9
Topic: Classroom Community

Group work does not come naturally to every student, especially not every group. Learners are encouraged to stay on task and collaborate with assigned roles such as Task Manager, Materials Manager, Speaker, and Scribe to keep projects on track.

5. Implement peer editing in formal and informal assignments

When students edit each other’s assignments, they can provide valuable feedback at every point in the writing or assignment process. Distribute rubrics and checklists for students to use as they read each other’s work and practice providing helpful, actionable feedback that their peers can understand and use. This strategy works at any grade level and may need to be taught explicitly at the beginning of the year.

6-8 Editable Peer Editing Checklist – Peer Review of Informational Expository Writing
Author: Sally Hansen – Planning with a Purpose
Grade: 6-8
Subjects: Prose, expository writing
Standard: CCSS W.6.5, W.7.5, W.8.5

These review checklists come in different levels of 3, 5 and 7 paragraphs so you can reach every learner in your class. This standards-compliant resource includes three print-ready peer editing checklists that have been planned and prepared for you.

6. Place students into long-term study groups

Cooperative learning isn’t just for academic skills—it’s for study skills, too! Create study groups where students quiz each other before exams, get organized at the beginning of a unit, or share struggles throughout the year. These groups can double as writing groups in elementary and middle school ELA classes.

Tips for Implementing Cooperative Learning

While you may already be using collaborative activities in your classroom, you may not know how to implement cooperative learning practices to ensure they run effectively. Regardless of subject or grade level, follow these tips to introduce cooperative learning strategies into your classroom.

• Teach communication skills. Don’t assume students already know how to work with each other! Spend time at the beginning of the year teaching and modeling communication skills, including active listening and how to handle conflict.
• Identify leaders early. Some kids stand out as leaders right out of the gate, while others need a little encouragement to take on the responsibilities of a leader. Decide who is who and distribute them evenly among your groups.
• Keep group sizes small. Larger groups may be too unwieldy to complete the work successfully, leaving some students to move on without doing equal work.
• Make the group heterogeneous. Everyone brings something different to cooperative learning, and groups should reflect a heterogeneous skill selection (advanced, typical, and difficult learners all in a group, as well as varying levels of leadership and social skills).
• Make the group fair. That said, you need to take steps to ensure that upperclassmen don’t do all the work. Delegation of roles and a focus on equal responsibilities ensure that things are distributed more equally (or you can see if they aren’t).
• Reflect on this process. Both you and the students will need to reflect on how a group functions on a regular basis. Maintain communication with the group, monitor their work, and make adjustments to group members or collaborative learning strategies when needed.

Coordination and cooperation with TPT

Classrooms work best when students work together. Whether they’re doing a quick mind-pair share or embarking on a two-month group research project, good collaborative learning strategies can help students learn from each other just as effectively as the teacher at the front of the room (maybe even more!).

Find more cooperative learning lessons and activities to bring your elementary, middle school, or high school classroom to its highest level and get kids talking like never before. You’ll also find ways to introduce other thought-provoking strategies into your classroom, including inquiry-based learning activities and assignments.