School Leadership Today

Leading Learning Pedagogy

Co-operation vs
collaboration
In the third of his series of articles about improving classroom
pedagogy, Chris Watkins looks at collaboration between pupils: why
do they enjoy it and how does it work?

W
orking with friends. Working as a
team. Working in groups. When
we ask pupils and teachers how
classroom pedagogy might be
improved, this is what primary schoolchildren say.
In secondary schools, meanwhile, a preference
for learning with friends was voiced by 53 per
cent of respondents in a 2008 MORI survey – an
increase from 35 per cent in 2007 and 28 per cent
in 1998. When we ask teachers about their own
best experiences of learning, they regularly report
times when they worked and learned with others
– but by no means all of their examples come from a
classroom context.
However, when we look into classrooms we find
that they are often not characterised by co-operation
or collaboration: for many years research on primary
school classrooms has shown that pupils may be
placed in groups around a table, but that does not
mean they are operating in groups. And in secondary
schools the 2008 survey shows that ‘working in small
groups to solve a problem’ has declined in the last
decade.
How might we explain this disjunction between
what people think is best and what we see in
classrooms? Some of the issues which have been
highlighted in the past include:

■ Teachers have seldom experienced classrooms

being run in a collaborative fashion
■ The culture of schools does not foster
collaborative work by teachers themselves
■ The dominant values in today’s schooling,
especially under the influence of hyper-
accountability, emphasise individualism

So is there any point trying to develop more

collaborative learning in classrooms? I believe

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 Pedagogy Leading Learning

so. It will generate important social learning and life skills for Collaboration is about creating something greater between
young people, a more balanced role for the teacher and better us than would have been achieved separately. In a classroom,
behaviour. There are benefits even if we accept the narrow students might be working in groups of two or more, mutually
educational priorities of the present time, as the research searching for understanding, solutions, or meanings, or
evidence suggests that collaborative learning is associated with creating a product. Their activities often require the exploration
higher performance, right from the earliest years in schooling: or application of the key ideas in the curriculum area being
“Over a school year, children in experimental classes improved addressed.
more than children in control classes with regard to academic Communication is central and is also the key to learning.
attainment, motivation to work with others, group and on-task As Annie (10 years) puts it, in an interview with Caroline Lodge:
focus and showed high levels of communicative interaction “You learn more [when working with others] because if you
with partners. It is concluded that young children are capable explain to people what to do, you say things that you wouldn’t
of engaging in effective group work that promotes academic say to yourself, really. So you learn things that you wouldn’t
achievement.” (Kutnick 2008, on five- to seven-year-olds) know if you were just doing it by yourself.”
So if we are to develop more collaborative learning in Collaborative learning aims to promote dialogue. Dialogue
classrooms, the following issues may need to be addressed: enhances understanding when learners explain to each other.
As learners become more adept in talking themselves through
■ what collaboration means and why it is important in problems and contexts, their ‘outer speech’ develops, and so
learning does their ‘inner speech’, giving greater power of self-direction.
■ designing tasks for collaboration Designing tasks for collaboration is a crucial element: the
■ prompting collaborative interaction and skills design of the task can be more powerful in creating the need
■ developing classroom structures for participation for collaboration than any other of the tactics we may resort to
(such as encouragement, or even more telling). There are three
One distinction that seems to prove useful is between co- key considerations.
operation and collaboration. When people are co-operating, First, the task must not be ‘decomposable’; in other words, it
they are adjusting their actions so that each person achieves must not be able to be completed by one member of the group,
their individual goals, whereas collaboration is about actions leaving the others to indulge in what has come to be known as
being adjusted in order to achieve a shared goal. In a classroom ‘social loafing’! So it would be counterproductive to give a group
you would see and hear different things for these two processes. of learners a set of maths exercises, for example, since one
You would see co-operating learners perhaps around a table person could complete them for the rest. Second, the task must
working on their own tasks (see figure 1), but hear them saying require the contribution of all members of the group, through
such things as “Pass the ruler please” to co-ordinate their use their different voices, angles, roles, and so on. This builds an
of scarce resources. Collaborating learners would be seen to interdependence which is reciprocal: each student is dependent
contribute to a shared task, and would be overheard saying on the contributions of all others.
things more like “Let’s try it like this”. Finally, the task cannot be a ‘right answer’ task: instead

Figure 1: Co-operating and collaborating learners

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 Leading Learning Pedagogy

it must require higher-order thinking and the negotiation Live experiences

of meaning. So if our group of learners were asked: “Look at The development of skills for collaboration is more likely to
these maths exercises, see whether there are different ways of come about through learners reviewing live experiences than
completing them, and decide whether one way is better than from anyone telling or ‘modelling’. If there has been a short
the rest”, the task would necessarily involve them in variety, briefing before the experience, a debriefing will naturally follow
strategy and decision making. Their interaction would need to but, again, will need some prompting. When the pupils review,
bring their perspectives together and reconcile them together. if they are asked to consider “What was it that helped?” and
Next we come to prompting collaborative interaction and “How could we make it better?”, most times they will come
skills. Most learners’ previous classroom history and much of up with similar things that the teacher might have noticed
their surrounding culture may not have prepared them well for and be concerned about, and sometimes their proposals for
collaboration, and the interaction may be disconnected or even improvement will be more credible.
competitive. So how can we encourage the appropriate sort of Then there is developing classroom structures for
interaction? Recent studies show the importance of briefing and participation. Most classrooms do not structure the way in which
prompting learners for the interaction which is to come. This learners participate with each other. When we ask pupils to
can be supported by offering them prompts to try out on key portray their classroom in a drawing, they often depict isolated
aspects: learners. A layout of rows or a seating plan based on gender
or attainment indicates that learners are not arranged to view
■ thought-provoking aspect of interaction. For example: “Why each other as resources for their learning. For improving on this,
is…… important?” and “What would happen if...?”; “What do the basic building block is pair work, through which the skills of
you think of my idea?” and “So you reckon that...” exchange dialogue, helping, and contributing to a new shared
■ social aspects of interaction, for example how best to be a product can develop.
help-seeker or a help-giver: “I’m confused about…”; “I don’t Small groups in a classroom context are often most
see why…”; “It would help me if you could explain…”; “Did successful beginning as threes or fours. Even here, starting the
you get that bit?”; “How does it make sense to you now?” process in pairs can be of value, and then coming to the small
■ emotional aspects, especially the clear communication of groups of four when further dialogue and learning take place.
emotional states, for example: “I feel…… when you…… As a further step the small groups can come together to create a
because……” whole-class product. This structure has sometimes been called a

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 Pedagogy Leading Learning

‘snowball’, because the product increases in size as the process

rolls on. If the initial task has been the same for all participants,
Classroom pointers when developing
the later stages run the risk of feeling repetitious.
more collaborative learning
A whole-class structuring practice which gets over such
1. The task which is aiming to promote collaboration. Check:
difficulties has its history in the context of improving race
• could this task be completed by one?
relations in 1970s USA following the desegregation of high
• does this task require something different from all?
schools. Rather than try to solve the difficulties that arose
• is this task requiring higher-order thinking?
between black and white students by bemoaning their lack
2. The interaction between learners which is meant to be
of skills or by creating ‘add-on’ strategies or programmes,
collaborative. Ask:
the social psychologist Eliot Aronson took the view that
• were learners supported, e.g. through prompts for how to be
core classroom activities needed to be addressed: “It would
co-operative?
be valuable if the basic process could be changed so that
• were learners invited to review their
youngsters could learn to like and trust each other – not as
collaboration – and when it went best?
an extracurricular activity but in the course of learning their
3. The structures for people to participate with each other. Is
reading, writing, and arithmetic.” (www.jigsaw.org)
there:
The approach that was devised can apply to any classroom
• a foundation of paired talk (‘talk partners’, ‘chatterboxes’, ‘study
activity that can be divided into component parts – a story, a
buddies’…)?
reading, a production, a new area of knowledge. The metaphor of a
• a progression to reciprocal teaching and collaborative groups?
jigsaw is used to describe the whole class making up a picture from
• a culmination in the whole class a learning community?
its parts. The classroom practice is to divide an area of enquiry into
different sections, each one of which is allocated to a sub-group of
the class. In phase 1, these sub-groups become temporary experts no significant differences between setting and mixed ability
in their section, and then in phase 2 the groups are recomposed teaching in overall attainment outcomes. Studies suggest little
with one expert from each section in the (now) ‘jigsaw’ group. evidence that ability grouping across KS3 contributes to raising
At this point the big picture is created – by students who standards for all pupils.”
have now grasped that picture through their own efforts and An interesting phenomenon sometimes occurs when
understandings. So diversity is embraced and the procedure operating classrooms in groups – the idea arises that some
makes use of that key strategy in promoting active learners sort of extrinsic motivation will be needed, such as a prize or a
– asking them to learn something in order to help others learn competition between teams. This may indicate that the focus
it. I have witnessed primary and secondary examples where has turned toward performance rather than learning, which is
teachers have been amazed at the high levels of engagement intrinsically motivating and is needed for highest performance.
and the high level of processing that occur in a jigsaw A recent experience was instructive on this issue: a creative
classroom. And the connection with levels of achievement was teacher, Jenny, reported: “We planned a project where groups
best made for me by Gemma, the science teacher for a group had to design a healthy fruit cocktail, and the best group would
of Year 8 disruptive boys, who exclaimed: “And they all learned win. When it came to it, we just dropped the competition aspect
much more than they were supposed to!” and it was brilliant.”
So how can we best manage the development of more Other reservations teachers may have, and which may need
collaborative learning in classrooms? The answer for me is to to be addressed, include the following:
apply the above ideas to our work with teachers:
■ “I couldn’t delegate to them!” So what model of leadership
■ start by having pairs of teachers plan together, something to are we ourselves displaying when we say that? And what do
which they can each contribute you think they think of being treated like that?
■ support them in high-level thinking, not compliance ■ “They don’t have the skills of collaboration.” Well, it’s our job
■ help them review, to identify what’s effective (both in to try to do something about that.
their classroom practice and in their relations during this ■ “Isn’t it likely to get noisy?” The idea that a good classroom
development) is a quiet classroom goes back to the monastery. Let’s
try to judge the quality of the buzz that develops during
During such development, there are some predictable tensions collaboration.
and some classic ‘ah, but...’ factors which are useful to anticipate. ■ “The caretaker wouldn’t like me moving the tables.” OK – it’s
One is the issue of within-class and across-class grouping good to be clear about our real priorities in school!
by so-called ‘ability’. This has become a more prevalent practice ■ “Won’t the ‘high flyers’ be held back?” Actually the evidence
in our schools following the pressure applied by central policy is that they are not, but anyway we need to find ways of
voices. But the evidence is not in its favour, so it should not embracing diversity rather than maintaining difference.
act as a barrier. A major review for the DfES in 2005 stated:
“Especially with regard to attainment, studies have not shown Chris Watkins is a reader at the Institute of Education,
evidence that streamed or set classes produce, on average, University of London, and an independent project leader
higher performance than mixed-ability classes… There are with schools. See www.ioe.ac.uk/people/chriswatkins

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