A Study On Relationship Between Application Of Cooperative Learning Strategy And Students’ Participation

Cooperative learning,a teaching method,in which students work together to achieve common learning goals,emerged in the United States in the 1970 s.Cooperative learning strategies have significant effects in improving the social and psychological atmosphere in the classroom,creating a development environment for students at different levels,improving students’ academic performance,and promoting students’ ability to solve problems.Therefore,it has been widely concerned by all countries in the world as well as has become one of the contemporary mainstream teaching strategies.Both quantitative and qualitative research methods are used in this research,including the instruments as questionnaires,student interviews and classroom observations.According to three dimensions of behavioral participation,cognitive participation and emotional participation,71 students are investigated with questionnaires before and after the experiment.At the same time,for the use of cooperative learning strategy in the experimental class,the experimental class is observed for one semester.In order to further support the results of the questionnaire and classroom observation,28 students and 2 teachers are interviewed and the following two questions are answered in the research.1.Is it feasible to apply cooperative learning strategy to improve students’ participation in English class? 2.What are the differences of three dimensions’ influence of cooperative learning strategy on classroom participation,including behavioral participation,cognitive participation,and emotional participation?What are the specific reasons?The results show that students’ behavioral participation,cognitive participation and emotional participation have been improved through the application of cooperative learning strategies.However,there are differences among the three dimensions of participation.The behavioral participation has the greatest influence of middle school students in English class,followed by emotional participation,and the improvement of cognitive participation is least in some degree.In view of the research results,the author proposes that teachers should pay attention to the key points when using cooperative learning.