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Thriving in Academe

Understanding Cooperative Learning

Strategies for Structuring Group Work
By Barbara J. Millis, U.S. Air Force Academy

Based on my own experience as a student in the ’60s, I hated group work and never used it in my teaching.

I learned in the 1980s that cooperative learning can help students learn. Through structured group work, I could accomplish passionately desired goals: enhancing critical thinking; promoting deep—as opposed to superficial—learning; encouraging both self-esteem and the acceptance of others; and, improving team skills. Best of all, I learned to shift the focus from me to the students.

Emerging literature on how students learn has deepened my understanding of cooperative learning. I now deliberately structure activities and assignments to "stabilize, through repeated use, certain appropriate and desirable synapses in the brain” (Leamnson, 1999, p. 5).

I also capitalize on the research on deep learning (Rhem, 1995) by having students independently prepare structured homework assignments intended to motivate them and get them into my knowledge base. I then reinforce and deepen this learning through in-class pair and group work.

Research, my own teaching, and the experiences of faculty colleagues, I find, enable me to build a coherent approach to teaching.

Meet Barbara J. Millis
Barbara J. Millis, director of faculty development at the U.S. Air Force Academy, received her Ph.D. in English literature from Florida State University. Besides publishing frequently, she offers presentations at professional and academic conferences and for various colleges and universities. Topics include cooperative learning, how students learn, peer classroom observations, the teaching portfolio, microteaching, classroom assessment/research, critical thinking, focus groups, and academic games. She lives with her husband, Ralph, and their 17-year-old daughter, Jeanne, in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Hobbies include watching the weather changes on Pike’s Peak, cheering Jeanne’s track and cross-country meets, reading, and traveling. Barbara can be reached at barbara.millis@usafa.af.mil.

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