You are doing collaborative learning and you don't even know it

If you take a look at the section "Classroom activities" in this blog you are going to realize that most activities are recommended for any number of students or for working in groups. I also posted a small note on group work in this same blog. This "insistence" on group work has a reason; students working in small groups tend to learn more of what is taught and retain it longer than when the same content is presented in other instructional formats (Davis, 1993). If all the types of intelligences have something in common is that students need to be actively involved in something to develop any intelligence and to tap into it later on. No one is going to effectively learn by being passive, and group work is the best way to keep students active because of the collaborative nature of it.


This is what collaborative learning is about. Students working together learning from each other and at the same time learning from themselves due to the interaction with others. Unlike individual learning, people engaged in collaborative learning capitalize on one another’s resources and skills.  More specifically, collaborative learning is based on the model that knowledge can be created within a population where members actively interact by sharing experiences and taking on asymmetric roles (Davis 1993). Collaborative learning also promotes creativity and skill development.


Collaborative learning can consist of formal or informal groups. Those groups formed for a single class are considered informal, while those groups that are going to be working for a long period of time and have to show a result as their work together are considered formal groups. Informal groups are useful in workshops and for classes in which there is a small one-day assignment. Formal groups are better for long term projects that have a big part of the term grade depending on them. 


Most of the activities presented in this blog can be used for both types of groups. It is up to the teacher how to use them and also to decide what type of groups work better for their class. As an example, if each week you are going to be working on a different theory, then you might want to work with informal groups. Students can benefit from this because if one group didn't work, they can try another the next week. 


What you might want to do is to check that the informal groups don't become semi-formal by having the same or almost the same members each week. As a teacher it is your prerogative to assign the group work every now and then. The idea of collaborative learning is to have students learning from each other. If they have the same group every week, then there will be a point when no one is going to learn anything new from their peers.


You might have been doing collaborative learning all along without even knowing it. Other names for this learning form are collective learning, learning communities, peer teaching, peer learning, study teams, study circles, study groups, and work groups (Johnson et al, 1991, as cited in Davis, 1993).
Please refer to the post " Encouraging healthy group work" in this blog for ideas and advice on how to work with groups in your classroom.