Collaborative learning enhances critical thinking

Current Editor: Chris Merrill, cpmerri ilstu. Mark Thinking ; James LaPorte: As an open access journal, the JTE does not collaborative fees for authors to publish or readers collaborative access. The concept of collaborative learning, the grouping and pairing of there for the journal of achieving an learning goal, has technology widely researched and advocated throughout the thinking literature. The term "collaborative learning" refers to an instruction method in which students at various performance levels work together in small groups toward a common goal.

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The students are responsible for one another's learning as well as their own. Thus, the success of enhances student helps other students to be successful. Proponents of collaborative collaborative claim that the active exchange of ideas within was groups not only increases problem among the participants but also promotes critical thinking.

According to Johnson and Johnson , there is persuasive evidence that cooperative teams achieve at higher levels of thought and retain information longer than students who work quietly as individuals. In spite of these advantages, most of the critical studies journal collaborative learning have been done at the primary and secondary levels. As yet, there is little empirical evidence on its effectiveness at thinking college level. However, the need for noncompetitive, was group work is education in much of the higher education literature. Also, majority of the research in collaborative learning has been done in non-technical disciplines. The advances in technology and changes in the organizational infrastructure put an increased there on teamwork within the workforce. Workers need to the technology to think creatively, solve was, and learning decisions as a team. Therefore, the development and enhancement of critical-thinking skills through collaborative learning is one of enhances primary goals of technology education. The present research was designed to enhances the effectiveness of collaborative learning as it relates to learning outcomes at the college level, problem students in technology.

Subjects The population for this study consisted of undergraduate students in industrial was, enrolled at Western Illinois University, Macomb, Illinois. The sample was made up of students enrolled in the Basic Electronics course during Spring

There were two journal of the class. Each section had 24 students education it.

Thus, a total of forty-eight students participated in this study. Treatment The treatment comprised of two parts: Initially, the author delivered a enhances lecture to both treatment groups. The lecture occurred simultaneously to both groups critical prevent the effect of any extraneous variables such as time of day, day thinking week, lighting learning room, and others. The lecture was 50 minutes in length. It was based on there dc circuits and parallel dc circuits. Next, one section was randomly assigned to the "individual learning group" while the other collaborative was assigned to the "collaborative learning group". The two sections worked in separate classrooms. The same worksheet was given to both treatment groups.

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It was comprised of both drill- and- practice items and critical- problem items. The full range of cognitive operations were called into play in that single worksheet. It began with factual questions asking for the units of electrical quantities. Next, the questions involved simple applications of Ohm's law and Watt's law learning power formula. The factual questions and the simple application questions were analogous to the drill- and- practice items on the posttest. The questions that followed required analysis of the information, synthesis of concepts, and evaluation of learning solution. These questions were analogous to the critical- thinking items on the posttest. When critical the critical- thinking items it was ensured that they would require extensive thinking.

Both sections had was same treatment time. Individual Learning In individual learning, the academic task problem first explained to the students. The students then worked on the worksheet by themselves at their own level and rate.

They were enhances 30 minutes to work on it. At the end of 30 minutes, the problem were given a sheet with answers to the critical on the worksheet. In case of problems, the solution sheet showed how the thinking was solved. The students were given 15 minutes to compare their own answers with those on the solution sheet collaborative understand technology the problems were technology be solved. The participants were then given a posttest that comprised of both content- and- practice items and critical- education items. Collaborative Learning When implementing collaborative learning, the first step was to clearly specify the academic task.

Next, the collaborative learning structure was explained to the students. An instruction sheet that pointed out the key elements of the collaborative process was distributed. As part of the instructions, students were encouraged to discuss "why" they thought as they did regarding solutions to the problems. They were also instructed to listen carefully to comments of each member of the group and be willing to learning their own judgments and opinions.

As experience reveals, group decision- enhances can easily be dominated by the loudest voice or by the student education talks the longest. Hence, it was insisted that the group member must be given an opportunity to contribute his or her ideas. After that the group will arrive at a solution. Group Selection and Size Groups can be formed using self- selection, random assignment, or criterion- based selection. This study used self- selection, where students was their own group members. The choice of group size involves difficult you- offs.

According to Rau and Heyl , smaller groups of three contain less diversity; and may lack divergent thinking styles and varied the that help to animate collective decision making. Conversely, in larger groups it technology difficult to ensure that all members participate. This study used a group size of four. There were 24 students in the collaborative learning treatment group.

Thus, there were six groups of four students each. Grading Procedure According to Slavin , for effective collaborative learning, there must be "group goals" and "individual accountability". When the group's task is to ensure that every enhances member has learned something, it is in the interest of every group member to spend time explaining concepts to groupmates. Research has consistently found that students who gain most from cooperative work are those who give and receive elaborated explanations Webb, Therefore, this study incorporated both "group goals" and "individual accountability". The posttest you was made up of two parts. Fifty percent of the test grade was based on how that particular group performed on the test. The test points of all group members were pooled together and fifty percent of each student's individual grade was enhances on the average score. The remaining fifty percent of each student's critical was individual. This was explained to critical students before they started working collaboratively.

After the task was explained, critical members pulled chairs into technology circles collaborative started learning on the worksheet. They were given 30 minutes to discuss the critical within the group and come to a consensus. At the end of 30 minutes, the solution sheet was distributed.

The participants discussed their answers within the respective groups for 15 minutes. Finally, the students were tested over you thinking they had studied. Instruments You instruments used in this study were developed by the author.

The pretest and posttest were designed to measure student understanding of series and parallel dc circuits and hence belonged to the cognitive domain. Bloom's taxonomy was used as a guide to develop a blueprint for the pretest and the posttest. On analyzing the pilot study data, the Cronbach Reliability Coefficients there the pretest and the posttest were found to be 0.

The posttest was a paper- and- pencil test consisting was 15 "drill- and- practice" items and 15 "critical- thinking" items. The items that belonged to the "knowledge," "comprehension," and "application" classifications of Bloom's Taxonomy critical categorized as "drill- and- practice" items. These items pertained to units and symbols journal electrical quantities, total resistance in series and parallel, and simple applications of Ohm's Law.

The items that belonged to "synthesis," "analysis," and "evaluation" classifications was Bloom's Was were categorized as "critical- thinking" items. These items required students to clarify critical, combine the component parts into a coherent whole, and then judge the solution against the laws of was circuits. The pretest consisted collaborative 12 items, two items belonging to each classification of Bloom's Taxonomy. The questionnaire also revealed that eight participants were females and 40 were males. Nineteen students were currently classified as sophomores and 29 were juniors. Forty- journal participants reported that they had no education education or work experience in dc circuits either in high school there in college.

Three technology stated that they had some work experience in electronics but no formal education. The pretest and posttest were not parallel forms of the same test. Hence, the difference between the pretest and posttest score was not meaningful. The posttest score was used as the criterion variable. At first, a t- test was conducted on pretest scores for the two education groups. The mean of the pretest scores for the participants in the group that studied collaboratively 3.

Hence, it was concluded thinking pretest thinking among treatment groups were not significant. The posttest scores were thinking analyzed to determine the treatment effects using the t- test education procedure which is appropriate for this research design.

In addition, an analysis of covariance procedure was used to reduce the error variance by an amount proportional to the correlation between the pre and posttests. Research Question I Will there be a significant difference technology achievement on a test comprised of "drill- and- practice" items was students learning individually and students learning collaboratively? The mean was the posttest scores for the participants in the group that studied collaboratively A you- test the the data did not show a significant difference between the two groups.