EFFECT OF
COOPERATIVE LEARNING STRATEGIES ON
STUDENTS ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE IN BIOLOGY
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background to the study
Biology
is widely used in various fields since it covers a wide range of activities.
However, the decline in biology achievement has been a source of concern to
many stakeholders such as educators, government, parents, students themselves,
to mention but a few. Among the reasons for the decline in biology achievement
in schools is the fact that many students experience biology anxiety in the
traditional classroom. This is a classroom where students are not actively in
developing knowledge; they receive information passively and are less
motivated. This passivity has caused much concern among plays a significant
role in enhancing the country’s socio economic and technological development.
The West African Examination Council (WAEC) Chief Examiner’s report 2016 noted
that the persistent poor achievement of students in biology at senior schools
certificate Examination (S.S.C.E) leaves one in doubt about the effectiveness
of instructional materials approaches used by the biology teachers for the
teaching and learning of biology. Therefore, teaching methods must be
re-examined and organized in such a way that there should be more emphasis on
instructional methods that will emphasize less lecture, more student directed
classes, more discussion and biology teachers should design classrooms that
will make students feel more successful. Students must have a high level of
success or a level of failure that they can tolerate. Studies have shown that
students learn best when they are active rather than passive learners (Nwagbo,
2008). Authors have argued that everyone is capable of learning, but may learn
in different ways.
Therefore lessons must be presented in a
variety of ways. For example, new concept can be taught through play acting,
visual aids, and hands on activities, technology and cooperative groups.
However, the quality of education that teachers provide to student is depend
upon what teachers do in their classrooms (Zakaria & Iksan, 2007). The
teaching method used in the class is one of the factors that make students
become passive and have less interaction with each other in doing Baird (1994)
have criticized the traditional (Lecture) method used by teachers because only
hardworking students can benefit from it. Therefore, to enhance the
understanding of biology, students must be more active in the classroom and
must creatively acquire knowledge, especially in understanding and solving
biological problems. Students should be given the opportunities to develop, to
interact, and to share with friends through cooperative learning activity.
Cooperative learning is a successful teaching strategy in which small teams,
each with students of different levels of ability, use a variety of learning
activities to improve their understanding of a subject. It is an educational
approach which aims to organize classroom activities into academic and social
learning experiences. There is much more to co-operative learning than merely
arranging students into groups, and it has been described as “structuring
positive interdependence (Brown and Ciuffetelli, 2009). Stressing their point,
the writers explained that cooperative learning requires students to engage in
group activities that increase learning and adds other positive outcomes which
include academic gains, improved race relations and increased personal and
social development. In addition, students who fully participate in group
activities, exhibit collaborative behaviors, provide constructive feedback, and
cooperate with their groups and there is every likelihood of their receiving
higher test scores and course grades at the end of the instruction. Cooperative
learning is an active pedagogy that fosters higher academic achievement and it
has also been found to increase attendance, time on task, enjoyment of school
and classes, motivation, and independence.
Brown and Ciuffetelli (2009) and
Siltala (2010) discussed the 5 basic and essential elements to cooperative
learning as:
1. Positive
interdependence: Students must fully participate and put forth effort within
their group and each group member has a task/role/responsibility. Therefore,
members must believe that they are responsible for their learning and that of
their group.
2. Face-to-
face promotive interaction: members promote each other’s success and students
explain to one another what they have or are learning and assist one another
with understanding and completion of assignments.
3. Individual
and group accountability: Each student must demonstrate mastery of the content
being studied and each student is accountable for their learning and work,
therefore eliminating “social loafing”.
4. Social
skills: Social skills that must be taught in order for successful cooperative
learning to occur include effective communication, interpersonal and group
skills such as leadership, decision–making,trust-building,friendship-development,communication
and conflict-management skills.
5. Group processing: Group processing occurs
when group members (a) reflect on which member actions were helpful and (b)
make decision about which actions to continue or change. The purpose of group
processing is to clarify and improve the effectiveness with which members carry
out the processes necessary to achieve the group’s goals.
Contributing
Webb, Troper, and fall, (2015) explained that in cooperative learning, students
are encouraged to be active participants in the construction of their own
knowledge. The authors added that cooperative learning also encourages students
to interact and to communicate with peers in harmony. In this way, cooperative
learning promotes values such as honesty, cooperation, mutual respect,
responsibility, tolerance, and willingness to satisfy a consensus, and
execution of duties in cooperative learning can develop self-confidence in
students. There are several numbers of cooperative learning techniques
available. Some of them utilize student pairing, while others utilize small
groups of four or five students. These techniques have been created into
structures to use in any content area (Melihan & Sirri, 2011). Among the
easy to implement structures are Think-pair –Share, Think-pair-write,
variations of Round Robin, Reciprocal Teaching Technique, Jigsaw, Jigsaw II and
reverse Jigsaw, Inside-outside circle, Reciprocal Teaching, STAD (or student-
Teams – Achievement Divisions), Rally Table, TGT (or Team Game Tournament). For
the purpose of this study, the researcher decided to explore the effect of TGT
cooperative learning on SS2 students’ academic achievement in biology. Team
game tournament is an effective technique of cooperative learning wherein
groups are created that function in the class for a period of time. In this
technique the groups revise at portion of material before writing a written
test. This motivates those students that have the fear of writing the test and
to learn and reinforce what has been already learnt. This method was basically
to increase student’s skills, increase interaction and self-esteem between
students. In this technique the students study in the class. The material is
supplied and is taught in groups or individually through different activities.
The students after receiving the material review it and then bring 2-6 points
from their study into their assigned groups. Since the tournament is based on a
material there is a specific answer. To use TGT technique, students are placed
into small groups to study and prepare for a trivia game. This gives students
incentive to learn and have some fun learning the material and knowing it is a
group exercise so not one student is to blame if a team loses (Slavin, 2015). The
writer went ahead to explain that this game is characterized by students
working in heterogeneous groups, and playing the games make the students to
more into homogeneous and higher level groups. The students compete in the
tournament after a designated time to study by forming groups of 4-5 students
where the stronger students compete with the weaker students and winner of the
respective team is moved to a high level team while the students who don’t
score well are moved to an easier level. This ensures that students of the same
ability are competing with each other. The technique is an effective tool to
teach biology as it motivates and helps students acquire skills and mastery
with the help oft heir peer and through healthy competition. A study by Zakaria,
chin, and Daud (2010) found that cooperative learning improves students’
achievement in biology.
Zakaria
et-al further explained that cooperative learning of materials and helps
students to achieve better grade Shimazoe and Aldrich (2010) stated that in
cooperative learning, students tend to enjoy biology, and this enjoyment
motivates them to learn. Melihan and Sirri (2011) concluded that cooperative
learning method is more effective that traditional teaching method in the
academic success of students. Students today have a need for practical biology;
this implies that biology needs to be relevant to their everyday lives.
Students enjoy experimenting and to learn biology, students must be engaged in
exploring, conjecturing, and thinking rather than, engaged only in rote
learning of procedures, therefore, there is the need to explore TGT cooperative
learning.
Cooperative
learning can be defined as a teaching method that involves students in learning
process in order to understand and learn content of the subject (Slavin, 2011).
Traditional class activities create a win-win situation, where one can only
succeed if other loose, while cooperative learning is direct opposite to it,
here conquest of all is success of all. Cooperative learning has edge over other
teaching methods in terms of its effectiveness for improved cognition, social
skills and motivation. Two major attributes that have distinguished cooperative
learning from traditional learning include interdependence (positive) as well
as accountability as each member of group is important for success (Slavin,
1990). Its competence in terms of augmenting academic achievement has been
proved many research studies (McMaster & Fuchs, 2002; Johnson, Johnson
& Stanne, 2000, Nichols, 2002, Winston, 2002). Cooperative learning also
improve positive attitude towards learning (Johnson & Johnson, 2008),
improved social relations (Johnson & Johnson, 2005), in addition to high
self-esteem and cohesiveness (Sahin, 2010). Cooperative learning can be also stated
in terms of instructional strategy in which students work together to achieve
learning target (Abrami, Poulsen & Chambers, 2004). It is also presented by
Polloway, Patton and Serna (2001) that the cooperative learning method when
used as a teaching activity, improves motivation, class participation and
academic achievement of students.
Cooperative
learning has been used many researchers as instruction strategy with positive
and improved results. A few studies have been carried out in local context
also, for example Iqbal (2004) conducted a study the examine the effect of
cooperative learning on academic achievement on secondary school students in
the subject of mathematics, he reports that there was a significant difference
between the achievement scores of the students taught by the cooperative and
traditional method. The students who were taught by the cooperative method show
high scores. Similarly Bibi (2002) and Siddiqui (2003) has carried out their
research by using cooperative learning for improving
performance
of ESL learners, the results were positive. Similarly, study carried out by
Arbab (2003) for two weeks on general science students also proved that
students taught with cooperative learning method has improved results than
control group. Additionally Kousar and Perveen has presented in two separate
studies on 7th and 8th graders in 2003 that students who were taught social
studies with cooperative learning method have scored high grades than others.
It is clear from above citation that research on cooperative learning in local
context had been carried out either in science subject, English language
learners or on school students, this study is different in both aspects; one it
has dared to chose subject of “education” which is considered an arts subject
and is taught generally through lecture method, two the participants of the
study is college students, who are usually not taken as sample due to
multiple
reasons, including burden of course work and short time.
Academic achievements of students have been found to
be enhanced by the use of cooperative learning (Lampe, Rooze &
Tallent-Runnels, 1998; Johnson & Johnson, 1989; Slavin, 1990, 1991; Webb,
1989). Stevens and Slavin (1995) stated that, the fact that ithas been linked
to increases in the academic achievement of learners at all ability levelsis
another reason for its use. Bramlett (1994), Megnin (1995), and Webb, Trooper,
andFall (1995) in their contributions noted that cooperative learning activity
engages thestudent in the learning process and seeks to improve the critical
thinking, reasoning, andproblem-solving skills of the learner.
While
research efforts on cooperative-learning indicate that it enhances student
achievement
(Johnson & Johnson 1989; Slavin 1990; 1991; Webb 1989), Lampe, Roozeand
Tallent-Runnels (1998) stated that peer interaction is central to the success
ofcooperative learning as it relates to cognitive understanding. They further
noted thatcomprehension is facilitated. Lampe et al (1998) again emphasized
that as learners, someof who might normally "turn out" or refuse to
speak out in a traditional setting, becomeactively involved in the learning
process through group interaction. Stahl and Vansickel(1992) noted that every cooperative-learning strategy, when used
appropriately, canenable students to move beyond the text, memorization of
basic facts, and learning lowerlevel skills. This method which results in
cognitive restructuring leads to an increase inunderstanding of all students in
a cooperative group.
Apart from academic benefits, cooperative learning
has been found to promoteself-esteem, interpersonal relationship and improved
attitudes toward school and peers(Johnson & Johnson, 1996). Lampe et al
(1998) stated that in a competitively structuredclassroom, except for the few
"Winners" or students who succeed, self-esteem can suffer.
When
competition is promoted, students may learn to value winning at all costs,
andcooperation may be discouraged (Lampe, et al 1998; Conrad, 1988). Although
theadvocates of cooperative learning are not opposed to all competition, they
do opposeinappropriate competition (Johnson & Johnson, 1996; Johnson &
Johnson, 1991). Stahl(1992) stated that inappropriate competition tends to widen
the existing differences andabilities, which, in turn, can widen negative
perceptions of others on the basis of gender,race, or ethnicity. Studies by
Glassman (1989), and Johnson, Johnson and Stanne (1986)and comments by Johnson
and Johnson (1996) and Trowbridge and Bybee (1996) oncooperative learning found
cooperative-learning groups to equalize the status and respectfor all members,
regardless of gender. Research by Klein (1985) noted by Lampe et al (1998)
revealed that competitively structured classrooms have the effect of
favouringboys or reinforcing sex role stereotypes that may limit opportunities
for girls. Incooperative learning this usually is not the case, where
interaction among students isintense and prolonged and students gradually take
responsibility for each other’s learning(Borich, 2004).
In general, cooperative learning can be said to lead
to the formation of attitudeand values, provision of models of prosocial
behaviour, presentation of alternativeperspective and viewpoints, building a
coherent and integrated identity, and promotion ofcritical thinking, reasoning,
and problem-solving behaviour (Borich, 2004; Stevens &Slavin, 1995;
Abruscato, 1994; Zehin & Kottler, 1993). All these result in
collaborativeskills improvement, better self-esteem and increased achievement.
(Johnson & Johnson,1996).
Science teaching and learning today is to a great
extent focused on activities bywhich the learner acquires facts, rules and
action sequences (Kpangban & Ajaja, 2007).
In a student-centered instructional approach like
this, using student ideas meansincorporating student experiences, points of
view, feelings, and problems into the lessonby making the student the primary
point of reference. A completely studentorientedlesson is always initiated by
asking students questions and assigning specificroles to them on the content to
be taught and their answers and dispositions wouldbecome the focus of the
lesson. This approach, according to Borich (2004), is intended toheighten
student's interest and to encourage positive attitude and feeling towards
thesubject. Research by Johnson and Johnson (1991) on learning together and
alone showedthat cooperative learning enhanced more positive attitude towards
subject members andthe teacher.
Evidences from research works in Nigeria indicated
that very little researchefforts had been directed at cooperative learning.
This approach has been highlyrecommended for teaching at all levels, as stated
by the Federal Government of Nigeria
STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
Despite the relative importance of
biology in science and information based courses as well as in medicine and
social sciences, students‟ performance in the subject in both internal and
external examinations has remained consistently poor.
Science educators are trying to
identify the major problems associated with the teaching and learning of
biology in the nigeria schools. Despite all these noble efforts, the problem of
poor performance in has continued to
surface in nation‟s public examination. Researchers also conducted studies on
the factors responsible for students academic performance in biology.
Yet performance and attitude of students in biology is generally
poor . Many students especially in the study area have fear and lack of
interest for biology; they shun away from biology classes, paid little or no attention to
lessons and as a result, continue to experience difficulties in answering
questions, particularly in genetics and biology in general. Therefore, they
have very poor performances and retention in terminal and promotional
examinations. To corroborate the above statement West African Examination
Council (WAEC) Zonal coordinator reported that 80% of candidates that sat for
the WAEC examination in the year 2015/2016 failed Biology. This agrees with the report of registrar
and chief executive of National Examination Council (NECO) who said that 71.92%
of candidates who registered for biology in the examination failed the subject.
This
without any argument cooperative learning was reported as effective strategy of
teaching biology at various places (Johnson & Smith, 1998). Hence, in an
attempt to possibly promote the performance students in biology while non
cooperative attitude of students towards
the teaching and learning of biology have effect on their academic performance,
in view of this, the aimed of this study is to find out the effect of non
cooperative attitude on students academic performance
OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY
The
major objective of this research work is to investigate the effect of non
cooperative attitude of students on academic performance in biology
The
specific objectives of this study were:
i.
To identify the effects of non
cooperative attitutude on students’ achievement.
ii.
To investigate whether the
cooperative learning method is more effective than the regular methods of teaching with respect to academic achievement of students in biology
iii.
II. To establish the attitudinal change towards cooperative learning
as a method of learning biology
RESEARCH QUESTION
·
What are the effects of non cooperative attitude
on students’ achievement.
·
Does cooperative learning
method more effective than the regular methods of teaching with respect to academic
achievement of students in biology
·
To what extent does the attitudinal change of
cooperative learning as a method of learning
biology
Research hypothesis
2 Is
there any difference between the mean performances scores of students
taught Biology using cooperative
learning strategy and their counterparts taught using lecture method?
2)
Is there any difference between the mean retention scores of students taught
geometry construction using cooperative learning strategy and that of students
taught using lecture method?
Significance of the Study
The significance of this study lies
in its potentiality of addressing key issues to the teaching and learning of
biology as a compulsory science
subject as well as being it prerequisite
for further education. This study is significant for the following reason:
This study will be of tremendous assistance
to all involved in the teaching and learning process. Specifically, it is hoped
that this study would be of help to the biology teachers. It is hoped to
provide a more efficient method of teaching biology considering the worldwide
reports about the capability of cooperative learning strategy. It is hope to
promote students personal relationship as they relate with one another during
lessons‟ periods and equally enable the slow learners to learn from the past
learners in the group.
The result of this study may also
provide curriculum planners necessary information that may be importance when
curriculum review is needed. The curriculum planners may use the result to
measure students‟ performance in achieving the set objectives of SS III biology
curriculum. On the other hand, professional bodies and associations would also
be beneficiaries of this study as their members meet annually to review and
update their members‟ knowledge in current researches in the field of
mathematics education.
Fellow researchers might also find
the study valuable from the design, method and the research gap been identified
for their further study in the field. Text book publishers may also find the
study valuable as they consider good methods of teaching when writing text
book.
The problem areas of the students
identified from this study would serve as a vehicle for further research work,
the result of this study may further show how to overcome the difficulties.
Scope of the Study
In
this study, the researcher investigated the effect of non-cooperative attitude
on students academic performance in Ekiti state. Senioir secondary
schools (SSS) III in Ikere Local government area were considered during the research. The
choice of SS III was because; they are the students preparing for SSCE examination.
Five selected secondary schools will be used for the study.