An experience in the use of the jigsaw technique to teach object-oriented design

Abstract

Cooperative or collaborative learning techniques are based on student cooperation aimed at the achievement of a common goal. With these kind of techniques, the student has to face the challenge of not only learning individually, but also explaining concepts or ideas to his/her classmates that they do not understand, which implies a practice of their communication, argumentation, and discussion skills. This paper presents a pre-experimental study about the teaching of object-oriented design using the jigsaw technique, including and evaluation based on pre/post testing. The results of the tests taken allowed us to corroborate that students who had some misconceptions at first, improved their knowledge and performance after their participation in the cooperative work. After the class, the students commented that the work carried out with the jigsaw technique improved their comprehension and learning about object-oriented design.