Cooperative Learning and Metacognitive Instruction

Seminar paper from the year 2004 in the subject Pedagogy - General, grade: A (excellent), Indiana University (Instructional Systems Technology), course: Instructional Psychology, language: English, abstract: INTRODUCTION There has been a lot of research concerning the problems of implementing new techniques and strategies into classroom instruction. The difficulties of innovation may be due to resistance to change, lack of congruence between teachers’ beliefs and practices and several other factors. This does not sound very optimistic in terms of improving learning situations for students. However, there are some ways to enhance student performance that at first sight do not seem to be very complicated but nevertheless are quite effective without depending on the former mentioned barriers too much. The purpose of this synthesis paper is to present recent findings concerning two of those strategies, cooperative learning and metacognitive instruction, and critically discussing their effectiveness and applicability as well as their limitations and implications for future research. First, a short overview is given on the problem of implementing new techniques in classroom instruction and changing teachers’ practices. This is done to provide a framework and consider the main constraints. Then, research on the two strategies is presented and discussed with regard to applicability and limitations. The main indicator of whether those strategies actually reach the student or not is student achievement as usual, even though it is certainly not the only important one and some other indicators are considered. Finally, a short summary and conclusion is given and implications for future research are considered.