The Effectiveness of Cooperative Group Learning in an English Language Classroom at a Private College in Kuala Lumpur

Abstract

The focus of this research is to study cooperative group learning as one of the types of grouping procedures in the language proficiency classroom. It will investigate the possible learning outcomes of cooperative groups including students’ academic achievements in their test scores in an English language classroom context. Besides that, this research will study the cooperative group learning attitudes and interest at the individual and group level. There are three learning strategies that are commonly used in a classroom. They are competitive, individualistic, and cooperative models of structuring students’ interaction in the classroom. In a competitive model, students will work against each other. While, in an individualistic model, students work alone with limited interaction in achieving their individual goals. However, in a cooperative model, students would work together to achieve common goals. A cooperative learning model refers to the use of a classroom technique in which students work on learning activities in small groups and receive feedbacks or recognition based on their performance. The task structure is the mix of activities that make up the learning effective Cooperative learning theory is applicable when students work together in a small group to ensure everyone can participate on a collective task that has been clearly assigned. The five essential components of cooperative learning are positive interdependence, face to face interaction, individual accountability, interpersonal and small-group skills, and group processing. This small-scale study will mainly look at four research questions to analyse the outcome of the cooperative group learning to help teachers and learners of ESL to have an effective lesson in the ESL classroom.