Benefits of Cooperative Learning in Physical Education with disaffected children

Cooperative learning (CL) is presented as an active methodology that allows all students to be co-participants in their own learning (Johnson, Johnson, & Holubec,1994). Schools with few resources, both human and financial,... [ view full abstract ]

Cooperative learning (CL) is presented as an active methodology that allows all students to be co-participants in their own learning (Johnson, Johnson, & Holubec,1994). Schools with few resources, both human and financial, could benefit from this type of methodologies where students can learn in collaboration with their peers due to the diversity of students present in these centers (Escartí, Gutiérrez, Pascual, Marín Martínez, & Chacón, 2006). The objective of this study was to design and carry out an educational intervention based on CL in a classroom where the diversity of students, given the difference in age, ethnicity and the presence of students with disabilities, makes the learning environment difficult. The hypothesis proposed was that the students would improve both the educational and affective climate after the didactic unit. It is a cross-sectional study that included 17 students from 4th and 5th year of Elementary Education from a marginal school in Albacete (Spain). An educational unit of 12 sessions was carried out based on CL in the subject of Physical Education. The instruments used were: 1) filled by students: record sheet of their perceived behavior, 2) filled by teacher: record sheet of students behavior and teacher's diary, and 3) video recording of the sessions. The results show that the majority of students were able to collaborate with each other to achieve a common goal. In addition, they were aware and honest in their perceptions of behavior, being reluctant to have them exposed in the behavior record sheet in cases of negative behavior. Therefore CL allowed the students to learn to collaborate to achieve the objectives set in the tasks and improved the affective relationships among the students.