Several Cooperative Learning strategies have been developed :[1]

a. Jigsaw: The students form teams, and each member of the team becames an expert on one topic by working with members of other teams who are assigned the same topic. For example, if there are six teams and each has five members (A, B, C, D, E), topics would be assigned like this:

A How long ago and how long did dinsours live?

B Where and how did they live?

C What are the types of meat-eating dinsours?

D What are the types of plant-eating dinsours?

E Why did dinsours become extinct?

When the students return to their original teams, they share what they learned about their resfective topics. All members of the teams are assessed on all topics.

b. Think-Pair-Share: In this type of Cooperative Learning strategy, the students think about question or topic, pair up with patners to discuss it, and shares their thoughts with the rest of the class.

c. There-Step Interview: The students working in this strategy also from pairs, each partner interviews the other and than shares what he or she has learned with the whole class.

d. Cooperative Projects:Co-op Co-op: The students work together in small groups toward a single goals, but each individual must make an identifiable contribution. We have already seen saveral examples of this strategy in this book, including Avril Font’s the students working in group workshops to learn about maypole dance or build a dragon and dramatize the story of St. George and the dragon. Kathy Lee’s the students provided another example when they worked on cooperative projects in group and made clay animation movies.

To work effectively , cooperative project group should have the following features:

1. Hateregoneous composition (ability, gender, race/ethnicity).

2. Individual accountability.

3. Group goals (positive interdepedence).

4. Shared responsibility.

5. Emphasis on social skills.



From statements above it can be concluded there are four strategies of Cooperative Learning method all of that discuss about, the students share with patners what they learned, the students think about the question or topic from text, the students discuss the text with their patners and the students work together toward a single goals.

2. The Advantages and Disadvantages of Cooperative Learning Method

a. The Advantages of Cooperative Learning Method

There are advantages to Cooperative Learning method, are:[2]

1. The student-faculty and the student-student interaction

2. Information retention, grades

3. Higher-level thingking skills

4. Attitudes toward subject, motivation to learn it

5. Teamwork, interpersonal skills

6. Communication skills

7. Understanding of professional environment

8. Self-esteem, lower level of anxiety (due to less emphasis on competition)

9. Race, gender relation (if CL is implemented carefully)

From statements above it can be concloded the advantages of Cooperative Learning method is can improve the students talk, gives the students opportunity with learn together, more varied talk and more negatiation of meaning.



b. The Disadvantages of Cooperative Learning Method

There are disadvantages of Cooperative Learning method, are:[3]

1. One of them is “having something all at your fingertips” effect. When responsibility for the group is undertaken by one or only a few people, others may participate in their success.

2. Members of the group may also ignore their responsibilities or display low success. In the event of this, the hardworking members may decrease their efforts, thinking that they are being exploited.

3. “The growing richer of the rich” is a condition in which the better students take more benefit of the work done by the roles they have undertaken.

4. While the student who “knows” learns better, the student who “doesn’t know” that much may worsen.

5. In “interference of the responsibility” condition, the more hardworking students do not rate the suggestions and explanations of others and ignore them.

6. While well-structured groups are successful, badly-structured groups become unsuccessful. The students who do not have enough selfconfidence may also experience difficulty in belonging to the group.

7. More talented students may feign less ability. There is a risk that the time is diluted as the responsibility is shared. The group may resist learning, and there may be destructive discussions.



From statements above it can be concluded disadvantages of Cooperative Learning method is some the students do not work well in their group, some the students need more time than others to understand and adsorb the information and some the students are shy or reserved and feel awkward when working with others.


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[1] Allin and Bacon (1999), Teaching Language Art..., p. 167-168.


[2] Richard M. Felder (2008), Active and Cooperative Learning..., p. 23.


[3] Ayhan Dikici and Yasemin Yavuzer (2006), The Effects of Cooperative Learning on the Abilities of Pre-Service Art Teacher Candidates to Lesson Planning in Turkey, Australian Journal of Teacher Education, p. 37.