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practices that are complex, like cooperative learning, when administrators
dictate new directions that pose added responsibilities on teachers.
On the other side, the nature of the innovation may affect the demands
placed on the organization to provide continued support. Teachers may
be so comfortable in the belief that what they do is integrated into their
work that they may pull out supports to CL without knowing it. An example
would be when supervisors who help teachers continue to implement CL are
eliminated; this erodes the support to teachers regarding their excellent
teaching/planning time. Practicing good quality cooperative learning requires
changes in the organization. Some factors that affect institutionalization
are: time structures, space structures and administrator training.
What are some indicators of institutionalization?
- Is cooperative
learning in the textbooks? If textbooks integrate it, teachers are more
likely to keep CL alive.
- Has there been
a general pedagogical shift by the teacher to student-centered learning?
If so, teachers can more easily withstand administrative pressures to
return to being "the sage on the stage."
- Are teachers evaluated
for using CL? If so, how, and for what purpose? Professional development?
Goal setting? Merit pay?
- Is CL something
that is inquired about in the hiring of teachers? How?
- Is it a regular
part of staff development? Do the school's documents such as curriculum
guides, talk about the components of CL?
- Do teachers decide
when and how much to use it?
- How does a school
district provide for organizational support?
Is it built into budget?
- Is there a high
level of teacher collaboration among one another: peer coaching, co-teaching
and planning together?
Call
for Research News on Our Website
The IASCE supports the
sharing of results from applied and empirical research in the field of cooperative
learning. We are also interested in teacher research, action research, results
of studies of teacher education programs actively using cooperative learning
and reports of research in international contexts. We can also use unpublished
reports on research, a report published elsewhere with permission granted
to post electronically, or if you would like the IASCE to reference your
work, send a document to one of the members of the Board. The IASCE Board
members responsible for organizing the research reports are: George Jacobs,
Christine Lee and Celeste Brody.
Research News on
Our Website
There are several items
about research that you will find on our website. These include:
- CLIQ (Cooperative
Learning Implementation Questionnaire). This questionnaire was designed
for part of a study being conducted by the Centre for the Study of Learning
and Performance at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
One of the goals of the centre is to study and promote effective classroom
processes through an active association with schools, administrators
and teachers. To achieve this goal the Centre staff conduct research
on classroom processes, train educators in new instructional methods,
provide on-going and follow-up assistance to teachers, and evaluate
the effectiveness of educational innovations. Teachers make use of a
variety of teaching strategies. The purpose of this questionnaire is
to learn more about the reasons why teachers choose to implement, or
not to implement, one of these strategies, cooperative learning.
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