PD BULLETIN_ A.

[12]
To : All Staff
From : Adnan Mohammed (PD Chairman)
Date : March 17th, 2011
Subject : Cooperative Learning
CC. : Deputy Directors, RPA Coordinator

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Cooperative Learning [2]

Frameworks
With the following frameworks, a teacher can simply adopt an existing lesson plan and modify the organization of
the lesson. All cooperative learning frameworks emphasize the individual accountability, positive
interdependence, team reward and equal opportunity. Students can contribute more to the success of their
teams if they show improvement in comparison to their basic level of performance.

1- Student Teams-Achievement Divisions (STAD)

This is the most basic framework of those that involve group study with group reward for individual achievement.
It involves four major steps:

A- Teaching: In this step, the teacher presents the material using whatever method he chooses.
B- Team study: The purpose of this step is to help team members master the material. Students, in this regard,
explain problems, check each other’s work, prepare answers and resolve discrepancies.
C- Testing: There is no more help during the quiz. Members’ performance affects the overall team’s score.
Quizzes are scored by the teacher or by the students. Points that are earned by each member are computed.
In STAD, the points contributed by each member are based on the improvement he shows over the basic
score (past record).
D- Team recognition: every team earning a predetermined number of points receives a reward or certificate.
Equal chances of success are open to all teams. This reward does not only motivate students to improve
individual performance, but also to help improve that of their teammates and to encourage them to learn.

2- Teams-Games-Tournament (TGT) :

This is similar to (STAD), except that instead of testing, (TGT) uses academic games or tournaments, against
equivalent members of other teams, to contribute points to their team scores. It goes over three steps.

A- The teacher begins by teaching the material. The class time is determined according to the nature of the
material.
B- Next, the teacher studies the teams. Students review the material the teacher presents in their teams. The
purpose here is to prepare students for the tournament.
C- In the third step, students participate in the tournament. Here students are assigned to different tables. In
academic games, students compete with members of other teams to earn points for their teams. To ensure
 that students have equal opportunities to succeed, tournament tables are assigned with students of the same
achievement level.
The game goes with a table having a deck of down-faced numbered cards, a game sheet and answer sheet.
The game sheet has a list of numbered questions to serve assessing students’ learning- just as the quizzes
do. Each student draws a numbered card from the deck. The student with the highest number becomes the
reader of the first round. Another student holds the answer sheet. The reader gets a card and answers the
correspondingly numbered question. The student with the answer sheet checks the answer. If the answer is
correct, the student keeps the card. If not, the card is returned to the bottom of the deck and the game
continues. If the students think that the reader gives an incorrect answer, they can challenge. The player with
the correct answer keeps the card. If the challenger gives an incorrect answer, he returns a previously won
card to the deck. Points are computed by counting the cards the students win to take back to their teams.
Low-achieving students have equal chances to win points as high achieving students do.
D- The final step is the team recognition where teams earn certificates or rewards. (TGT) is unlike (STAD) in that
it does not provide a way to assess individual student performance.

3- Jigsaw II:

In jigsaw II, which uses the task specialization with group reward for individual learning, each member of the team
becomes an expert on an aspect of the lesson content and shares that expertise with the other members of the
team. Each student shares the information he learns quite like that in a jigsaw puzzle. It is an adaptation of
Aronson's (1978) Jigsaw method and involves six steps.

A- Teaching: The teacher introduces the lesson and the objectives to be achieved.
B- Reading: The students are divided to focus on a different topic while reading in the material. Students from
different teams, with the same assigned topic, meet in expert groups to discuss their topics.
C- Expert groups: The responsibility here is for students to help each other learn the material to teach it to their
teammates later. After they have become experts, students return to their teams for team reporting.
D- Team reporting: In this stage, pieces of the puzzle are assembled together. Experts teach team members
about their topics. The members listen carefully as they are expected to learn all the material.
E- Testing: Students are individually accountable for learning the material; therefore, they work alone on a test
covering all the material.
F- Team recognition: This is based on how team members performed in the test. Scores are calculated the sway
in (STAD). Earned points are based on improvement shown over past performance.

Regards,
Adnan Mohammed
Chairman, PD Committee

Slavin, R.E. When Does Cooperative Learning Increase Student Achievement PD COMMITTEE