Cooperative Learning Between In-service Teachers And Pre-service Teachers

The paper aims to explore the application of cooperative learning between in-service teachers and pre-service teachers and to make out the influence of it on their English learning and professional skills. To be specific, the study tries to answer the following questions:(1) how does cooperative learning benefit in-service teachers and pre-service teachers in class?(2) What are the problems during the process of their cooperation?(3) How to solve these problems in order to make full use of cooperative learning between in-service teachers and pre-service teachers?(4) What are students’attitudes towards the cooperative learning? The results of these questions can help to optimize the cooperative learning between in-service and pre-service teachers and help them to make the most of the programme to fulfill their own academic achievement and develop their professional skills.The research is conducted among2010cohort of M.Ed. students in the English department of a university in central China, including43pre-service teachers and25in-service teachers. By asking them to finish the questionnaire and seven of them to take part in the interview, a lot of useful data are collected as the main source of the findings of this paper.According to the data analysis, the study finds out that:to start with, cooperative learning between in-service and pre-service teachers have positive effects on their English learning and professional development, such as providing relaxing learning atmosphere, raising their motivation, enhancing their professional skills, etc. Then, the problems during their cooperation cannot be ignored. For instance, lack of time, teachers’monitoring, and students’passive participation and so on. However, these problems can be well dealt with if teachers and students can work together to solve them.This study provides some practical guidance to the cooperative learning between in-service and pre-service teachers in the Master of Education training project: in-service teachers and pre-service teachers will make full use of cooperative learning and conduct it more effectively by taking measures to avoid some possible problems. At the same time, the study is full of theoretical significance because it enriches the theory of cooperative learning and provides some theoretical base for the further research on cooperative learning between in-service teachers and pre-service teachers.