Cooperative Learning

Implement a cooperative learning strategy. Explain whatyou did and reflect on its impact on your case study student as well as your other students.

Cooperative learning is a great concept and used everyday at Highlands. It is implemented in every class and kids understand it extremely well. Cooperative learnings is a successful teaching strategy in which small teams, each with students of different levels of ability, use a variety of learning activities to improve their understanding of a subject. Each member of a team is responsible not only for learning what is taught but also for helping teammates learn, thus creating an atmosphere of achievement. Students work through the assignment until all group members successfully understand and complete it.


I used a cooperative learning strategy last week that included a survival game. I had the class split into teams where they had to work together. Each team had to successfully go from one end of the gym to the other end of the gym without touching the gym floor. They had some obastalces to go over, through, under etc. During the game they had a certain amount of equipment that included scooters, mats, ropes etc. to help them all succesfully make it across the gym floor. The whole team was not safe until everyone made it across the gym floor succesfully. They had to work as a team to figure out strategies and concepts that would work to accomplish the task.
Questions about cooperative learning. Who invented cooperative learning? Does every elementary school in Edina use cooperative learning or concepts of cooperative learning?