MAKALAH TEACHING ENGLISH as FOREIGN

LANGUAGE METHODOLOGIES
COOPERATIVE LEARNING
(CL)

DISUSUN OLEH :
RICHARD RAY (321810118)
FADHIL ABDUL GHAFAR (321810193)
RAYNALDI (321810067)

Program Studi : Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris

INSTITUT KEGURUAN DAN ILMU PENDIDIKAN

TAHUN AKADEMIK 2018/2019
SEMESTER GANJIL
 Cooperative Language Learning

What is Cooperative Language Learning?

Cooperative language learning is focused on the idea that teaching should
make maximum use of cooperative activities and interactions. Fighting against
older ideas that teaching should be teacher-fronted and that strong and weak
students should be educated separately, cooperative language learning maintains
that in cooperative group work students are likely to scaffold each other and
therefore raise the language level of the class.

Cooperative Learning Principles

Many principles have been proposed for cooperative learning. Below is one
list of eight such principles.
1. Heterogeneous Grouping. This principle means that the groups in which
students do cooperative learning tasks are mixed on one or more of a
number of variables including sex, ethnicity, social class, religion,
personality, age, language proficiency, and diligence.
2. Collaborative Skills. Collaborative skills, such as giving reasons, are those
needed to work with others. Students may lack these skills, the language
involved in using the skills, or the inclination to apply the skills. Most
books and websites on cooperative learning urge that collaborative skills
be explicitly taught one at a time.
3. Group Autonomy. This principle encourages students to look to
themselves for resources rather than relying solely on the teacher. When
student groups are having difficulty, it is very tempting for teachers to
intervene either in a particular group or with the entire class. We may
sometimes want to resist this temptation, because as Roger Johnson writes,
“Teachers must trust the peer interaction to do many of the things they
have felt responsible for themselves”.
4. Simultaneous Interaction (Kagan, 1994). In classrooms in which group
activities are not used, the normal interaction pattern is that of sequential
interaction, in which one person at a time – usually the teacher – speaks. In
contrast, when group activities are used, one student per group is speaking.
In a class of 40 divided into groups of four, ten students are speaking
simultaneously, i.e., 40 students divided into 4 students per group = 10
students (1 per group) speaking at the same time.
5. Equal Participation (Kagan, 1994). A frequent problem in groups is that
one or two group members dominate the group and, for whatever reason,
impede the participation of others. Cooperative learning offers many ways
of promoting more equal participation among group members.
6. Individual Accountability. When we try to encourage individual
accountability in groups, we hope that everyone will try to learn and to
share their knowledge and ideas with others.
7. Positive Interdependence. This principle lies at the heart of CL. When
positive interdependence exists among members of a group, they feel that
what helps one member of the group helps the other members and that
what hurts one member of the group hurts the other members. It is this
“All for one, one for all” feeling that leads group members to want to help
each other, to see that they share a common goal.
8. Cooperation as a Value. This principle means that rather than cooperation
being only a way to learn, i.e., the how of learning, cooperation also
becomes part of the content to be learned, i.e., the what of learning. This
flows naturally from the most crucial cooperative learning principle,
positive interdependence. Cooperation as a value involves taking the
feeling of “All for one, one for all” and expanding it beyond the small
classroom group to encompass the whole class, the whole school, on and
on, bringing in increasingly greater numbers of people and other beings
into students’ circle of ones with whom to cooperate.
A Few Cooperative Learning Techniques
More than 100 CL techniques have been developed (see Jacobs, Power, &
Loh, 2002; Kagan, 1994; Sharan, 1994 and the websites in the appendices to learn
more of these). Below, three simple CL are described. Simple is good, i.e., what
makes an activity challenging and exciting are the topic and the task more so than
the CL technique.
1. Circle of Speakers
a. In groups of 2-4, students take turns to speak. Several such rotating
turns can be taken.
b. Students listen as their partner(s) speak and perhaps take notes, ask
questions, or give feedback.
c. The teacher randomly chooses some students and asks them to tell
the class what their partner(s) said.
d. This technique can also be done with students taking turns to write,
or they can write and speak at each turn.
2. Write-Pair-Switch
a. Each student works alone to write answers.
b. In pairs, students share answers.
c. Students switch partners and share their former partner’s ideas with
their new partner.
3. Question-and-Answer Pairs
a. Ss work alone to write one or more questions.
b. They write answers to their questions on a separate sheet of paper.
c. Ss exchange questions but not answers.
d. After Ss have answered their partner’s questions, they compare
answers.
Cooperative Learning Lesson Plan Considerations
Cooperative learning represents a major change from teacher-fronted
instruction and, therefore, raises new issues that educators need to consider
(Cohen, 1994). At the same time, using CL does not mean abandoning teacher-
fronted mode; it means combining various modes of learning. Below are five
issues that many L2 teachers raise when they undertake or even contemplate
undertaking CL.
1. Difficulty level
Difficulty level of activities may be the largest stumbling block to
successful CL use. Especially when beginning with CL, the task should be
an easily doable one, so that students can feel comfortable and confident
working in groups. Ideas to consider here include starting CL with easy
tasks, carefully clarifying procedures so that students know what they will
be doing, providing examples of what groups are being asked to do, and
monitoring groups so that teachers can provide help when needed.
2. Sponge activities
Often some groups or group members will finish before others. It may be
useful for teachers to be prepared with extra activities to “soak up” this
extra time, in a way similar to that in which a sponge soaks up extra water.
Some ideas include doing homework or extensive reading, helping other
individuals or groups who have not yet finished, comparing answers with
others who have finished, and doing an enrichment activity such as
creating similar tasks as is done in Question-and-Answer Pairs.
3. Groups that don’t get along
CL groups are often selected by the teacher to promote heterogeneity.
Thus, students may initially feel uncomfortable with their groupmates who
they might not have known before or who perhaps they knew and did not
like. As a result, groupmates may not get along with each other. Some
ideas for addressing this include helping groups enjoy initial success,
explaining the benefits of heterogeneity, doing teambuilding activities to
 promote trust and to help students get to know each other, and teaching
collaborative skills.
4. Noise level
Some teachers worry that the noise level may be higher than acceptable
during CL activities. Some ideas to consider in this regard include
accepting “good” noise, arranging the room so that students sit close
together, asking students to monitor the sound level, and using writing
instead of speaking.
5. Use of the L2
Students are often tempted to use their L1 when working in groups. We
should discuss with students what constitutes appropriate L2 use. Also,
students need sufficient language support, such as dictionaries (and other
reference sources) and pre-task examples. Referring back to point one in
this section, when seeking to promote proper L2 use, we need to consider
whether the level of task difficulty is appropriate. One more idea is to use
heterogeneous groups with at least one relatively more proficient student
in each group.

The Pros and Cons of Cooperative Language Learning

Cooperative learning is a unique environment where students and teachers
work together. In small groups, students of all ability levels are grouped together.
Each student learns the material being taught, but also helps other students within
the group to learn the materials as well. In the end, the goal is to create an
atmosphere of accomplishment. Is cooperative learning an effective method of
teaching? Here are some of the pros and cons to consider.

The Pros of Cooperative Learning

1. It encourages integration.
Students from different demographics are all combined, creating
cooperation between socioeconomic backgrounds, cultures, and
 ethnicities. Cooperative learning eliminates the barriers because everyone
is equally responsible for each other.
2. It produces empathy.
The threat of bullying is reduced with cooperative learning because
students develop an empathy for each other. Each student winds up being
in advantageous and disadvantageous roles, letting them see both sides of
the equation.
3. It creates real skills.
The modern working world requires a cooperative team environment.
Even people who work from home are interacting and cooperating with
others within their industry. This learning process helps to develop the
vocational skills that are necessary to make this environment happen.

The Cons of Cooperative Learning

1. It can create cliques.
When there is one consistently over-performing student and one that is
consistently under-performing, it creates disharmony in the learning
environment. One student feels like they’re forced to be a full-time
teacher in addition to their own responsibilities.
2. It can create masking.
Students who become fearful of being accountable for not understanding
a lesson will mask their lack of understanding in a wide variety of ways.
Some will call others names. They may say that learning is “stupid.”
Some students even attempt to guess the answers in the off chance they
might be correct.
3. It creates a lack of independence
Because the group is responsible for each other, the importance of the
individual gets lost over time. The group is important, but so are the
individuals that make up the group.
 Cooperative learning is often emphasized because it can create high levels
of self-esteem and a better learning environment, but sometimes those benefits
come at a cost. By evaluating the pros and cons, each teacher can determine if this
style of learning is right for their classroom.

Teacher and learner role

The teacher's role in this method differs from normal classroom settings.
While frontal teaching may be the norm in some other methods cooperative
language learning uses this form of teaching only on selected occasions. One
feature of this method is the great mixture of teaching styles. A lesson can easily
consist of frontal teaching sequences, as well as pair and group work phases
where the teacher is more or less left out, depending on the activity (e.g. Gallery
walk, Jigsaw etc.).

The teacher's task is to provide the material, to set the classroom settings, to
set goals for the students, to structure the classroom and the activities and to help
and monitor students in the work phase. However, the bulk of the work has to be
done before class starts and so it can be said that in cooperative language learning
classrooms are much less teacher-centred than some other methods.

The learner's role is primarily to work collaboratively with each other and
develop and practice social skills. It is important to accept new ideas from other
students, because the students have to share ideas (not compete to see who has the
best), accept criticism and they have to learn to make use of the foreign language
also when the teacher is not around.
Theory and characteristics
Cooperative language learning is based on the idea that second language
learning can be best done in heterogeneous groups, when all students work
collaboratively and cooperatively for one common goal. It replaces the idea that
students have to work competitively against one another. On the contrary, it rather
supports the idea Vygotski claimed in his Sociocultural (S-C) Theory, which
states that “Interaction not only facilitates language learning but is a causative
force in acquisition.” (Saville-Troike 2006: 111).[1] Vygostki was of the opinion
that social interaction is seen as the only way of learning a language sufficiently
and therefore he came up with his idea of the zone of proximal development
(ZPD), “an area of potential development, where the learner can achieve that
potential only with assistance” (Saville-Troike 2006: 112).

Taking Vygotski's idea where language learning is done with social

interaction, cooperative language learning focuses on language learning in natural
settings through the use of interaction in pairs or/and group work. This means that
interaction within one heterogeneous group can lead to a maximum of language
learning, if the students work collaboratively. To do so, they have to use the L2
and share the idea of achieving a common goal, which is not on the first side the
learning the language, but solving the exercises. This means that the actual
language learning process can be seen as a side effect of the task, because students
have to use the foreign language just as a means of communication. That also
lowers the anxiety of talking in a foreign language and therefore it encourages
students to make use of it, but being less afraid of making mistakes.

Richards and Rodgers (2001: 193f.) premise 5 principles that underlie the
interactive and cooperative nature of language and language learning:

1. "Humans are born to talk and communication is generally considered to be

the primary purpose of language."
2. "... most talk/speech is organized as conversation."
 3. "... conversation operates according to a certain agreedupon set of
cooperative rules or 'maxims'."
4. "... one learns how these cooperative maxims are realized in one's native
language through casual, everyday conversational interaction."
5. "... one learns how the maxims are realized in a second language through
participation in cooperatively structured interactional activities."
Cooperative language learning puts these principles of language and language
learning in the driver's seat.

Theory of learning
As already stated, the theories of Vygotski and Piaget can be seen as setting
the base of cooperative language learning. As shown in the premise, social
interaction is maintained to be necessary for language learning and thus
corresponds perfectly with the principles of cooperative language learning. In
working cooperatively, students share the idea of working together and achieving
a common goal.

Every member of the group has different ideas and skills and in sharing
them with the others, the group can take a maximal profit out of it all.
Furthermore, different skills mean that every member of the group has the chance
to participate and so every group member is important for the success of the group
work. The emphasis of this approach is on cooperative work rather than on
competitive work.

Cooperative language learning also encourages students in their critical

thinking, because in cooperative environments, different approaches to certain
topics occur and the students have to think and consider the whys and hows.
Therefore they have to analyse possible solutions, which is another reason why
heterogeneous groups are an advantage rather than a disadvantage in cooperative
language learning environments.
 Conclusion
Cooperative learning, according to the research (see Johnson & Johnson,
1999; Johnson, Johnson, & Stanne, 2000; Slavin, 1995 for reviews), offers many
potential benefits beyond enhanced L2 acquisition. These benefits include
increased self-esteem, greater liking for school, enhanced inter-ethnic ties, and
improved complex thinking. Furthermore, CL offers one small ray of hope that we
can move away from the all-too-present unhealthy forms of conflict and
competition that plague our world today (Kohn, 1994).

However, using CL may be difficult at first. It requires some initial thought,

some long-term vision, and some persistence to succeed. Often, students may not
be familiar with or skilled at working together. Fortunately, the CL literature
allows us to learn from the trial-and-error and effective practices of educators who
have come before us. With this assistance, we and our students can come to enjoy
and benefit from cooperation in the classroom and beyond (Sapon-Shevin, 1999).