The Influence of Cooperative Learning Strategies on Teacher Practices,Student Perceptions of the Learning Environment,and Academic Achievement

Abstract

This study describes the results of a 3-year evaluative investigation of teachers’ involvement in a cooperative goal structuring project. A specific focus is the efficacy of the project to enhance teacher use of cooperative goal structuring strategies with resultant changes in the classroom learning environment and achievement gains in reading and language arts. The results suggest that cooperative goal structuring strategies can be learned by teachers through longterm, in-service programs. Further, with prior achievement, grade level and initial cooperative environment perceptions held constant, length of teacher experience with cooperative grouping is significantly associated with both end-of-year reading achievement and student perceptions of the degree of cooperation in their learning environment. This does not hold for language arts achievement or for the hypothesis that degree of cooperation in the learning environment would directly influence student achievement.