Cooperative Classroom: How to Best Prepare New Generations for the 21st Century Practice

The dramatic development of communication technologies and media brings new challenges to education. With easy access to information, students in the globalized world are adopting new approaches and habits in the ways they manipulate data and content. Traditional methods represented by mediating information through frontal teaching are no longer efficient, as they seem unable to develop adequate skills to organize, critically evaluate, and use accessible content. They also fail to prepare students for professional performance. It is also unlikely that the students or the social trends would adjust to the old frameworks. Education at macro as well as micro level needs to acknowledge this reality, and seek new, functional approaches to teaching and learning. Research shows that the growing amount of information easily available through modern technologies and media cause split attention and shortening of the attention span in students. At the same time, the students face an increased demand on advanced skills in reading comprehension, critical analysis, and reflection in spoken and written interaction. This paper argues that cooperative learning methods are an ideal tool to deal with large quantities of information through natural human interaction and best prepare for professional performance. By maximizing social encounters in pairs, teams or groups, the approach provides ample opportunities to form and refine opinions, boost critical thinking, and develop communication skills. In educational setting, the methods help maintain students’ attention by actively and consistently involving all participants, as well as prepare them for natural working dynamics in their future practice. As such, they represent an ideal tool to develop key competences for both academic and professional success, reflecting the conditions and needs of the 21st century. The text explains the fundamentals and basic categories of the cooperative learning methods and outlines, for their implementation in education.