Parte01 CSFVM

1.
Definition of the four key elements in order to investigate Web Based

Learning. (CSVMontesca)
ACTIVE LEARNING: A METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH..
WHAT IS ACTIVE LEARNING
“Active Learning” is an umbrella term describing the teaching approach popularised

by Bonwell and Eison (1991) that refers to several models of instruction that focus
the responsibility of learning on learners. The teaching method is centred on work
seen as the ability/opportunity to “interact” with the subject studied.
Active Learning’s historical origin is in the field of pedagogy and education, in peer
tutoring conceived and applied by Andrei Bell (in India) and Joseph Lancaster (in
London) between the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th. The Bell
and Lancaster methods (Peer Tutoring/Mutual Teaching) used the students that were
better prepared and more intelligent as “under teachers” giving them, under the
guidance of a teacher, the responsibility for a small group of pupils. It was from the
end of the 19th century with the Active Schools or New Schools movement (from
the French école active introduced by Pierre Bovet and Adolphe Ferrière) that the
concepts of “Active Learning” and “cooperation” – till then known only in the
educational field as an answer to a material problem (Bell, Lancaster and their
disciples) – that they find a specific cultural connection with the introduction of a new
principle, or better, with an educational scenario no longer centred on the teacher’s
figure but on the pupil’s. The rigid and centralised system of the class pivoted on the
figure of the teacher seen as a “dispenser” of structured knowledge established on
the basis of uniform programmes. This system gave no possibility for dicussion and
learning was a mere transmission of notions assessed from time to time. Now, the
figure of the student is seen as an individual, complex and specific; a natural and
social active subject, an actor of his own training and growth, a privileged beneficiary
and agent of the educational process in which education is seen as “discovery”,
“game” and “construction”. When we refer to Active Learning we think of Adolphe
Ferrière, O. Decroly, E. Claparade and Celestin Freinet.
Bridging Insula Europae

134214-LLL-1-2007-IT-COMENIUS-CMP
The action has received funding from the European Commission

Adolphe Ferrière (Geneva 1879-1960) was the founder in 1899 and director till 1925
of the Bureau International des Ecoles Nouvelles and also one of the three founders
in 1921 of the Ligue Internationale pur l’Education Nouvelle. He was also the
interpreter and mediator of the different concepts inspiring the New School
movememts emerging in several countries, presenting them in a uniform way under
the name of Active Schools borrowing the term from Pierre Bovet. Through the
Bureau International des Ecoles Nouvelles in 1919, the movement published its
theoretical foundations in 30 points from which emerges that within the new
educational plan manual work is key for and complementary to intellectual training.
O. Decroly (1871-1932), a Belgian physician and psychologist was very critical of the
traditional teaching methods of his time for their inability to training students to face
day to day life; he therefore founded in 1907, at Ixelles near Brussels, a school for
young children called “L’Ecole de l’Hermitage” operating on the basis of his theories.
Starting from the idea that Man is basically a biological being with primary needs and
inclined towards social life, the educational and school systems should supply
necessary intellectual tools and develop in the students all those practical skills
needed for the full satisfaction of their needs in a social environment. Schools must
teach how to face life starting from life itself, from experience and active practice
since relating knowledge with survival (satisfaction of one’s needs) (theory of the
centres of interest) the acquisition of knowledge becomes interesting and
functional. The Ecole de l’Hermitage experience is nowadays kept active by L’Ecole
Decroly near Brussels.
E. Claparède (1873-1940), psychology scholar and professor at the University of

Geneva, together with Ferrière and Bovet founded in 1912 the Institute of
Educational Science J.J. Rousseau of Geneva. Contrary to Decroly’s experience,
Claparede’s reflections on pedagogy remain only theoretical since he never created a
“workshop” school; however, his thought will be a conceptual reference point for the
whole movement and will have a key role for its implications in the study
programmes of the Institute J.J. Rousseau and on the psychologists and pedagogists
who followed him (in particular, Claparede’s pupil Piaget).


The Active School, widespread in the Western world, although with theoretical
differences and particular applications deriving from the experience and formation of
the single scholars (C. Reddie and J. H. Badley in England, A. Manjon in Spain, E.
Lietz, G. Wyneken, P. Geheeb, G. Kershensteiner in Germany, W.H Kilpatrick, C.W.
Wasburne, E. Parkhurst in the US, Maria Montessori, the Agazzi sisters, Giuseppina
Pizzigoni in Italy), did not succeed in influencing in a significant way systems and
methods of teaching which were traditional in those times, always falling into the
field of private and somewhat elitist initiatives.
It was against the private and elitist nature of these schools and against the
“isolation” that the thought and the teaching practices of another supporter of the
movement, Celestin Freinet (1896-1966) were inspired. On the one hand he
continued criticising the traditional institutions and teaching methods recognising on
the other that the thought of Claparede, Ferrière and Cousinet was too theoretical
and “sterilised” since it reflected the image of childhood with no difference between
children of well-to-do families and poor ones; he therefore exposed the objective
difficulties – type and quality of the structures to be used – in applying such methods
in a mass or in a marginal context, thus producing in fact an exclusion. Freinet’s
major effort was in fact to widen the base of operation of the principles of the new
movement and transferring and applying them to the public institutions. In order to
overcome the limitations and difficulties, Freinet transformed the methodological
concept into action – going beyond abstractism – simplifying the teaching techniques
and adapting them to the school system and training context.
The concepts of “cooperation” and “active learnig” are so deeply rooted in Freinet’s
thought and practices that they have an impact on the whole educational
environment since they are not only instruments applied during the teaching process
inside the classroom – the “life books” were printed, distributed and circulated in
schools: a kind of intra-school communication offering the opportunity to start
dialogue and cooperation between students of different schools and classes -.
Freinet’s action has also a strong impact on teachers’ professional skills and on
research on education and training – C.E.L. - Cooperative de l’ensegnement Laic (the
Lay Schools Cooperative Society) was founded in 1928 with the aim of creating a
contact between those state school teachers, mainly French, who were interested in


applying and implementing the new method and in proposing techniques and
methods alternative to the traditional ones -. Freinet’s activity did not stop at
teaching: after WWII international congresses were organised in Europe, in Asia and
Latin America. In 1951 the CTS (Cooperativa della Tipografia e Scuola) was founded
in Italy – changed in 1956 into M.C.E. Movimento di Educazione Cooperativa
(Movement for Educational Cooperation), still operational – supported by Ernesto
Codignola (Scuola Città Pestalozzi, Florence) and with representatives throughout the
whole of Italy. In 1958 Freinet founded the F.I.M.E.M. (Federation Internazionale des
Mouvements de Ecole Moderne). On the same lines of Freinet’s international activities
immediately after WWII, the Movement for Popular Culture was founded in Brazil
supported by the reforming action in the field of education of Paolo Freire (1921-
1997). Even though Freire’s motivations as well as his political and existential
implications were very strong – education coincides with emancipation, “freedom for
the oppressed” and is the engine for action and transformation of history – tha basis
and the foundations typical of Freinet’s thought can be found in the action of the
Brazilian educator, while at the same time the concepts of collaboration and
cooperation are central in education activities: “No one educates anybody, no one is
self-taught, men are educated together through the mediation of the world”.
The traditional methods are once again strongly criticised – traditional education is
“depository teaching” characterised by long-winded lessons and by methods judging
people’s “conscience”, by assessment through reading, by distance between teachers
and students, by passing up criteria, by historiography, in other words by everything
being “digested” and where individual thought is prohibited. The traditional method is
recognised not as the opportunity for real personal growth and maturity, but as an
instrument of control and domination by the ruling class. “Depository education”
prepares to be passive, to be instructed, to obey orders and enact them. Against
notional knowledge and a system which, as in the case of “elite schools”, is only a
tool of control and power, man is placed in the centre, freed from his social status
and at the same time divested of any abstract connotation, immersed in real life in
order to make his/her on experiences: removing students from an individual level to
collectivity, an educational process in which the “dialogue” between teachers and
students and students between themselves is enacted as a freedom practice in
contrast with traditional teaching and with the teacher/students dichotomy.


With Frenet’s European experience and the contribution by the J.J. Rousseau
Institute if Geneva and Freire in South America, the concepts of collaboration and
active learning are the key points of the movement for the renewal of teaching
methods as privileged in teaching and learning practices.
After WWII and particularly in the 1970s studies and efforts are intensified in order
to define the dynamics and mechanisms of active and cooperative learning to create
a teaching organisation oriented in that direction, borrowing methods from
psychology (Kurt Lewin, Piaget, Vygotskij) as well as from sociology (Deutsh).
ACTIVE LEARNING SEEN AS LEARNING BY DOING
DEFINITION OF LEARNING BY DOING
If we limit our study to the “interaction” concept in a practical and material

dimension, the term “Active Learning” may be associated to “Learning by doing”
defining the latter as a learning method enacted through “doing”, “operating” and
action.
“Learning by doing” is based on the “Discovery Learning” pedagogic movement born
in the 1960s with Jerome Bruner. Bruner maintains that “Practice in discovering for
oneself teaches one to acquire information in a way that makes that information
more readily viable in problem solving" (1961). Discovery Learning is a method
through which students are encouraged to interatc witn their learning environment,
explore and manipulate objects guided by pre-arranged problems to which solutions
must be found.
“Active Learning/Learning by doing” is also decribed as a combination of techniques

and strategies aiming at creating the real participation of each single student in the
learning process. Although interaction can be achieved both individually and through
group work, Active Learning privilidges nowadays the latter aspect introducing it in
professional and asdult training vis a vis the school and young people’s educational
world.


The following are some of the techniques and strategies implemented by the
method:
 PEER TEACHING/COOPERATIVE LEARNING (SEE SPECIFIC PARAGRAPH)
PROJECT WORK: this is a professional project implemented by the trainees at

the end of the teaching cycle. The students, under the guidance of their
teachers, are divided into groups and must independently develop a project
by applying and coordinating the techniques, knowledge and competences
acquired during the course expressing new potentials, new resources and
skills.
 ROLE PLAYNG: “Role games” used to envisage real situations thus giving the
students the chance to confront with the real world (the term is very similar
to Simulation/Goal Based Scenarios) and to take somebody else’s role, the
result being the acquisition of new knowledge and the outlining of group
behaviour and individual creativity. Role Playing is generally divided into
four steps:
• Warming up: through specific techniques (sketches, interviews,

debates etc) to create a relaxed and constructive state of mind in
the participants.
• Action: the students must identify themselves in different roles and

try to find solutions to the problems posed to them.
• Cooling off: the students step out of their roles and the game
• Analsys: analysis, comments and debates on what has happened
 SIMULATION/GOAL-BASED-SCENARIOS; a real life situation is artificially created. The

students can practice and take realistic decisions and pursue a professional
objective through knowledge and skills functional to its achievement. The
aim of the simulation should be chosen to motivate the participant who
would then use all his/her already acquired competences thus creating an
ideal situation in which old and new knowledge would integrate one
another.
 DRAMA: STAGING A PROPER CONTEXTUALISED THEATRE ACTIVITY.


This type of competition creates a strong team spirit thus intensly living the
experience so that the difficulties the group is facing may be overcome. Two
teams challenge one another improving situations suggested by the teacher
or by a facilitator (tutor) in the presence of a referee who decides the length
and nature of the improvisations. Another more simple form is the selection
of short literary extracts from a management text which will be read by the
actors. All texts will be selected according to the subject to be treated:.
 BRAIN STORMING: this is a technique used to bring to the surface ideas of the
members of the group that are then analysed and reviewed as follows:
• define and break-down the problem
• outline the type of intervention according to the solution required:
creative or traditional
• produce new ideas
• decision and evaluation of ideas (for these last two steps the groups
should not exceed 6/10 individuals and be as mixed as possible)
• a report where the ideas are assessed in terms of feasibility,
convenience and compatibility with the company which is the object of the
simulation
 PROBLEM SOLVING: is the process through which problems are analysed,

confronted and positively solved.
ACTIVE LEARNING AS COOPERATIVE LEARNING
DEFINITION OF COOPERATIVE LEARNING
According to Johnson, Johnson and Smith (1991) “Cooperative Learning” is a

teaching/learning method directly involving the students through work carried out in
small groups in order to reach a common goal in conditions including the following
elements:
1. Positive interdependence. Members are encouraged to establish a type of

relationship which does not allow individual success and the aim is achieved by


the whole group and therefore each participant takes care of his own and
everybody else’s work. In fact, if the work carried out by one is not satisfactory,
everybody else would suffer the consequences.
2. Face-to-face promotional interaction. Although part of the work can be assigned

and done individually, a certain amount of it must be carried out through the
interaction of all participants by an exchange of information, challenging other
members’ conclusions and, above all, by teaching and encouraging each other.
3. Responsibility and individual assessment. All group members are responsible for
the work assigned and for learning whatever there is to acquire the knowledge of.
4. Proper use of social skills. Students are encouraged and assisted in developing
and practicing cooperative competences such as communication, establishing
mutual trust, shared leadership, ability in problem solving, all of which must be
properly taught and learnt.
5. Control and revision of group work. The participants set the objectives
periodically assessing the work in progress and deciding on the future changes to
improve the group’s efficiency.
If we accept this definition, the term “Cooperative Learning” does not simply single
out a group of students working together but a learning method which includes the
aforesaid elements.
Models and characteristics of contemporary Cooperative Learning.
The best known models are the following:
1. Learning Together
2. Structural Approach
3. Group Investigation
4. Student Team Learning
5. Complex Instructions

6. Communities of Learners
7. Cognitive apprenticeship
Each method is different from one another since it focuses on specific aspects, such
as:
• R.E. Slavin’s Student “Team Learning” emphasises the importance of extrinsic

motivation;
• S. Kagan and M. Kagano’s “Structural Approach” is based on the principles of
simultaneous interaction, equality and participation through positive
interdependence and individual responsibility;
• Elizabeth Cohen’s “Complex Instruction” aims at changing the educational
prospects of teachers and students by overcoming their prejudices and the
assignment of different roles in carrying out more complex tasks also to prevent
the risk of favouring the more able students as it might happen in small groups;
• “Group Investigation” has developed mostly in Israel.
LEARNING TOGETHER
This method was conceived in the US by David and Roger Johnson (University of
Minnesota, Cooperative Learning Center) and was included in the 'Circles of
Learning'. The concept of cooperation/collaboration is applied as a “process” through
the creation of work groups of 2 to 6 students who work together sharing the
resources and mutually helping each other. The method includes also a “reward
system” with rewards and bonuses according to the work carried out by each group.
'Learning Together' is based on the awareness and knowledge of three dynamics in

which the class work can be presented and organised which are linked with the
three psychological processes in learning outlined by the authors:
1. individual learning/individualistic form

2. competitive learning/competition form
3. cooperative learning/cooperation form


1. THE “INDIVIDUALISTIC” FORM
This is formed by the following elements:
• each students works individually;

• the classroom is organised with separate workstations running along the room
perimeter;
• clear explanation of the tasks: content, activity, objectives for each single
participant, awareness that the work carried out is in no way connected with
that of the other students.
2. THE “COMPETITIVE” FORM

• the groups are formed by classification, from the more to the less proficient
students; they are mixed groups so that each one has a student who can
compete with colleagues of equal skills from other groups;
• the competition takes place between members of equal skills belonging to

different groups so that the final assessment is obtained by adding up the
score of all members belonging to the initial groups;
• the groups are separated from one another;
• the material is structured in a cooperative form when the groups work

separately, and in a cooperative form when they are in competition;
• clear explanation of the task: group work and work for the competition; the
other group is the rival to beat, therefore if each individual will be the best in
each group in the competition also the cooperative group to which he/she
belongs will come out the best since the scores will be summed up.
3. THE “COOPERATIVE” FORM

• groups composed of 3 to 6 students, preferably mixed.
• accommodation in a semi-circular classroom so that the participants may

share the materials, look at each other and speak in a low voice;


• a copy of the material is given to each group so that the students are forced
to work together;
• clear explanation of the task: objectives, contents, activity, assessment

criteria, stressing on the shared responsibility in the achievement of the
objective by the students;
• role distribution: e.g. one student takes notes, another reads the final
elaboration etc.
• work must be carried out according to established rules.
The “Cooperative” form is also based on five key elements, according to D and R.
Johnson:
1. Positive Interdependence, where the students are committed to the

improvement of the performance of each individual member since individual
success is impossible without collective success;
2. Face-to-face or constructive interaction;
3. Individual and group responsibility, the group is responsible for aim
achievement and each member is responsible for individual contribution;
4. Accomplishment of specific social skills necessary for the
interpersonal relationship within the group, the students operate in their
roles required by the work creating a climate of collaboration and mutual
trust;
5. Group assessment, the group assesses the results achieved as well as its
modus operandi and sets improvement objectives.
1. Formal Cooperative Learning. Students work together from one hour to a few
weeks to achieve the learning objectives and making sure that each individual within
the group carries out successfully the assigned task. Each learning task, for each
discipline and in every curriculum can be structured in a cooperative model. Any
discipline can be structured in a form type of cooperative learning and the teachers
will:
• decide before the lessons begins;


• specify the lesson’s objectives;
• explain the task to be carried out and the type of interdependence which will be
used;
• check the students’ learning level and mediate within the group to supply
assistance and to improve the group’s interpersonal skills;
• asses the students’ learning level helping them in reviewing their group’s
learning.
2. Informal Cooperative Learning

Any kind of encouragement can be used to help the students to work together in
order to achieve a learning objective. The groups are formed ad hoc and last for a
few minutes to a whole lesson. Informal groups help the teacher to ensure that the
students become proficient in work organisation, know how to explain topics,
summarise and integrate the material inside the conceptual structures already
acquired or learnt during the lessons.
3. Cooperative basic groups

These groups are always mixed and they can last a whole school year. They allow
the students to establish continuous relationships thus supplying support, help,
encouragement and assistance to accomplish the work more efficiently, progress in
the studies, learn the appropriate ways to develop cognition and socially helpful
skills. These groups meet every day in elementary schools and about twice a week
in other grades. The members interact informally every day within and through the
class, discussing about their work and helping those in need with their homework.
Group work improves attendance, personalises class work and improves learning
quality and volume.
STRUCTURAL APPROACH
Spencer Kagan (1944-), is a professor of psychology and pedagogy at the Berkeley

University and is considered the father of the structural approach theory in a
cooperative teaching system applied both in child and adult education. The theory
and the development of Kagan’s structures were conceived around the 1980s


through an experimental research on children’s motivation towards socialisation and
their ability to interact.
Kagan’s model does not describe the parts of a cooperative learning process (S. and
M. Kagan’s theory shares the same five elements outlined by D. and R. Johnson:
positive interdependence, face-to-face interaction, individual and group
responsibility) but defines a “structure” of work in methodological and technical
terms aiming at an effective development of a cooperative learning process and
social organisation of the class.
"The structural approach to cooperative learning is based on defining the use of the
various ways, called structures, to organise individual interaction in the class. The
definition and the analysis of the structures allow the systematic planning of
cooperative learning lessons. The structures achieve foreseeable results in school,
language, cognition an social spheres; they are also combined to create multi-
structure based lessons; new structures are dveeloped and old ones evolve”.
The "Structural Approach" is divided into 4 key elements:
• elements;
• structures;
• activities;
• lesson planning.
"Elements can be defined as actions having the teacher, the individual or the group
or a couple of people as actors, and one or the other, according to the cases, as
beneficiaries”. In terms of cooperative action they can be the individual reflection,
debates between couples, sharing with the whole class. “A sequence of elements
functional to the achievement of a target forms a structure. Structures can be of
several types and are applicable to different objectives and contents, e.g. forming
of groups or of the class, introduction to a lesson, command of cognitive elements,
good communication skills, reflection or acquisition of specific competences”.
Each structure is formed by more “elements”, that is by cooperative work units

limited in time and to specific activities and tasks. The “Structural Approach” allows


teachers to have a whole range of tools which can be modified or widened.
Furthermore, since these structures are independent from content and activity – as
they are merely a set of coherent actions – once teachers have become familiar
with them they have a range of planning tools which can be easily used for lesson
planning during their curriculum programme. “Together with a content they form
an activity. Several activities allow lesson structuring or planning”. Structures are
therefore defined as useful tools for lesson planning and are considered
organisation and structuring models for interpersonal relations within a group; they
also obtain or help in the achievement of foreseeable results.
The structures, their variations in answer to different needs and with different
functions are divided into 6 categories:
• teambuilding;
• classbuilding;
• command of knowledge;
• cognitive competences;
• information sharing;
• communication competences.
Interaction between these elements allows efficient cooperative lesson planning.
Giving each of these structures a specific name allows teachers and students alike
to learn and memorise them more easily. For instance, saying “Numbered Heads” is
more quickly understandable and descriptive than saying “Group colleagues who
consult with each other before putting their individual responsibility on the line”.
These are therefore 4 good reasons to give the structures a specific name:
- students know exactly what they have to do;
- they are easier to remember;
- a name makes communication among teachers easier;
- structures become quantifiable curricula.
Kagan’s idea fully recognises and outlines the teachers’ strategic role


"... the basic difference between the structural approach and all other methods is
that the latter see teachers planning or using complex lessons, whereas the
structural approach is based on very simple teaching strategies. In using the other
methods, cooperative learning is taught as a subject, whereas with the structural
approach, cooperative learning becomes part of each lesson through the use of
simple structures”
The task of a teacher is to fill the structures and the cooperative elements with
contents chosen according to the objectives and level of complexity, as well as
proposing the activities.
Kagan is a supporter of the multiple intelligence theory and therefore suggests

multi-structural lesson planning which include a vast number of structures able to
stimulate the students’ different intelligence and sensitivity. “There must be a
multi-mode input with an impact on the students’ different senses since some of
them are more inclined to learn through vision, some through hearing and some
through kinetic learning”. Kagan insists on the use of simulations, movies,
exhibitions of finished products, provocative questions, contrasting experiences,
interviews to colleagues, presence of experts etc. some of the proposed structures
help to encourage relations favouring multiple intelligence, others emotional
intelligence and high level cognitive competences.
GROUP INVESTIGATION
This method was conceived in Israel by Yael e Shlomo Sharan and Rachel Hertz-
Lazarowitz: "It is a teaching method in which students collaborate in small groups
to examine, understand and experiment the subject studied”.
Group investigation tries to change the interactive model, according to which the
teacher poses the questions and the student answers them, by redefining the role
of teachers and students assigning to the former the task of answering the
questions more than asking them.
Group Investigation focuses on learning activities based on group research work.
Motivation to learning or “wish to know” must be stimulated by the presence of a
problem. The teacher presents the problem which becomes the object of research
among the groups thus promoting collaboration.


The objectives of group investigation are:
• create the conditions to allow the students, in collaboration with their

colleagues, to single out the problems, establish the procedures to understand
them and collect the relevant information;
• give the students the feeling of being “a learning community” in which

knowledge is acquired through cooperation;
• promote group debate to outline the questions more important for problem
solving; the research is focused mainly on the so called open-ended questions
which allow certainty in the answers and make the students sure that their
questions are well worthy attention;
• change the teachers’ traditional role: their task is no longer to ask questions but
to provoke them;
• exploit the emotional sides of learning: students’ commitment, increased level

of self-awareness, research of personal significance.
Sharan writes: “the group is certainly an ideal structure to bring together all personal
needs: anxieties, doubts, students’ personal desires – but is also an unbeatable
instrument to solve social problems […] When working on a research task together
with the group colleagues the single individual becomes aware of the different
viewpoints which allow them to understand who they really are, looking at
themselves projected in other people’s viewpoints”.
Starting from:” The students carry out a research: learning in cooperative groups”
the group research is structured in the following steps:
1. once given the object of research they examine the material, ask the relevant
questions and divide them into categories which become sub-topics. They then
form the research group by sub-topic;
2. the groups plan the research strategies and together prepare the activity
development course; they also decide how the research should be carried out and
assign the task to each member;
3. the groups carry out the research work. The members collect, organise and
analyse the information received from the various sources, report their findings


and reach the conclusions. The members discuss the work in progress in order to
exchange, widen, clarify and integrate ideas and information;
4. the groups prepare their presentations. Each member outlines the most
significant item emerged from their research, plan how the results should be
presented. The representatives of each group form a guidance committee to
coordinate the project’s final presentation to the class;
5. the groups produce their presentations in various modalities (posters, tracing
paper, etc) the audience will assess the clarity of the presentation and the level of
attention raised;
6. Teachers and students will assess the projects. The students will exchange
views on the research and of their personal experience. Teachers and students
will express their joint assessment of the individual, group and class learning.
The Student Team Learning, conceived by Robert Slavin focuses on an incentive and
assessment method involving personal responsibility, mutual help and equal
opportunities of success through the assignment of incentives and rewards in order
to encourage the group to mutual commitment and help. The rewards vary according
to age or situation, but are always a public recognition of the results achieved. Each
member is responsible for the achievement of these results through personal
commitment and the other members’ help. Interdependence ensures everybody the
chance of success if they all improve on their previous performance. The teacher
organises mixed groups, presents the rewards, draws up and approves the
classification tables.
Slavin outlines a series of different cooperative learning methods entailing
competitions between groups of the same skill level. The stress is put on the
achievement of group objectives but also individual responsibility is considered
important in terms of improvement of personal performance. Also the less gifted
student is encouraged to improve his/her own performance.
The main elements of Student Team Learning are:
1. rewarding the group;
2. individual responsibility, also towards the other members;
3. equal opportunity for success.


The cooperation techniques in Student Team Learning are five:
• STAD (Student Team Achievement Divisions)

The teachers present a new topic then divide the class into mixed groups of four
members each. The members examine the information received and then assist the
other colleagues in the group. Weekly quizzes are assigned and individual scores are
registered. The teachers also write down the score improvements between old and
new tests. The students who reach a given performance level are either assigned a
better classification or given a reward.
• TGT (Teams-Games-Tournaments)
The teacher introduces a lesson on a certain subject or carries out a period of
lesson/debate. From this start the students’ activity; assisting one another, they
review the written tasks based on the information received. Then the students will
take part to weekly tournaments in which groups of the same skill level compete by
answering the highest number of questions put forward by the teacher. Each correct
answer scores a number of points. The groups with the highest score are rewarded.
• JIGSAW
The “jigsaw” method, conceived by Elliot Aronson, uses task specialisation: each
student is assigned a task which contributes to the group’s final objective. The
students are divided into mixed groups of 3 to 6 individuals and each of them is
assigned a part of a lesson. Each student works individually to become fully familiar
with that part of the lesson and is responsible for transmitting his/her knowledge to
the other group, as well as having the task to carry out an in-depth study of the
information received from his colleagues. The teacher will assess the group’s
knowledge level on the subject as a whole. Individual marks will be assigned after an
examination.
• The “jigsaw II” model conceived by Slavin is more effective when the object of the
lesson consists in concept learning rather than in ability. All students read a passage
or a short story and each one of them, within a group of 5-6 individuals, is given a
certain amount of written information on a different subject. After having read what
has been given to them some of the students, one for each group, meet a group of
“temporary” experts composed of colleagues who have studied the same subject.


After a debate has taken place the students will go back to their original groups and
will teach their colleagues all they have learnt on that specific subject. At the end of
this process, an individual quiz including all the studied subjects will be handed out.
Then the teacher will present each group with a certificate stating the improvements
on the basis of the scores obtained by solving the quizzes.
• TAI (Team Assisted Individualization)

The TAI model is a maths programme combining cooperative learning with individual
education. The main point of this approach is that less gifted students can improve
their performance without slowing down the more clever ones. This is achieved by
mixing low, medium and high level students in teams of 4-5 members. The process is
divided into the following phases:
o the students undergo a test and are placed in an individualised programme;

o they work and carry out their task independently and each at his/her own level;
o they have group meetings, swap documents and reports, check each other’s math
skills and help each other;
o complete an assessment quiz;
o once the work has been completed the students undergo a final test. The groups
receive an award based on the average number of units completed by the
members of the teams.
In the TAI approach the role of the teacher is to introduce the more important
concepts by direct teaching before the students begin to work on their individualised
units. Sometimes the teacher holds the lesson to the whole class. Furthermore, the
teacher assigns “reality tests” to the students. The use of this approach improves
both self-esteem and math performance.
• CIRC (Cooperative Integrated Reading and Composition)

The CIRC is a cooperative learning model for reading and composition. Its main
elements are the following:
o Reading. Instead of using a text book, teaching is carried out through group
activity (e.g. the students can help each other in identifying the literary elements


of an extract; the plot, the characters, the scene. They can also anticipate the
end of the story or can repeat it anew).
o The art of writing/language. Teaching technocal aspects of writing is integrated
with written tasks using a language text. The students help each other in writing
original compositions or stories.
o Cooperation. This implies team work carried out by two students, coming from
different reading groups. They take it in turn to read, check if what is read is also
understood, check the spelling, compile written texts and spread books and essays
on the art of writing. For the assessment the students will have to analyse
appropriate texts when their team colleagues feel ready, and awards certificates are
given on the basis of the average results achieved by the whole group.
COMPLEX INSTRUCTION
The Complex instruction method by Elisabeth Cohen was first started around the
1980s at Stanford university aiming at achieving equality in the class through the
study of causes of social disparities and setting up new educational practices based
mainly on cooperation and capable of bringing to the surface these elements of
disparity (and iniquity). This objective is reachable only if interaction among students
takes place on an equal status basis and to obtain this goal it is absolutely necessary
to introduce a deep change in the bad habits of the school system. Complex
Instruction is a method which stems from acceptance of the plurality of intelligences
(a conquest of great pedagogues such as Gardner, but not yet introduced in Italian
schools) which must be achieved by the re-structuring of relationships within the
class. This model gives great importance to sociological processes, to equality in
educational opportunities, to status dynamics and their consequences when
influencing both school life of single students and that of the class. Complex
Instruction’s starting point is the acceptance of the fact that the setting up of a small
group favours the best students even if there is the intention by the team members
to help the least gifted, since the subjects enjoying a higher status tend to emerge
and have a strong influence over the whole team although sometimes they do not
possess the competences attributed to them by teachers and colleagues. The mixing
of different levels of students is not a disadvantage but is a growth opportunity both
at cognitive and social level. The method focuses on strategies to be followed in order


to give all team members the same learning opportunities, and is decribed by the
following steps:
1. review prejudices on teachers’ and students skills;

2. teach the students how to interact and how to use specific competences to carry
out the required tasks;
3. teachers must define complex tasks requiring the application of a series of actions;
4. organise complex tasks;
5. assess work group in order to improve it.
COMMUNITIES OF LEARNERS
In the "Communities of Learners” model suggested by Ann Brown and Beatrice
Ligorio the class is seen as a proper community where all actors can play different
roles swapping tasks and responsibilities. The students are all apprentices: they
learn new things by putting their competences on the line, have access to new
information using original communication channels and tools, discuss with the
others already acquired and dubious knowledge, debate over ideas, problems and
questions. The teacher is no longer the only depository and official dispenser of
knowledge even if he/she continue to be useful figure and model, a support and a
facilitator in collecting and assessing information. Students no longer are the
passive subjects in receiving the notions but are considered active subjects in
knowledge acquisition. The most important didactic objective is to allow students to
acquire the command of active learning strategies. Each “community” member is at
the same time apprentice and teacher and shares his/her knowledge with all the
others. Each member is considered a source to be consulted on information
gathering, answers to questions, reflection and all share their knowledge with the
others. Special attention is given to self control, self orientation and self
assessment skills. The students’ great introspective power is key for curricula
organisation and for the re-elaboration of the theoretical approach. For instance,
students have a role in the planning and outlining of curricula thus becoming partly
responsible.
From a theoretical point of view an important re-elaboration action sees classes as

a proximal multiple development areas interacting with multiple agents. The


subjects interacting with proximal development areas may be people (adults and
children with equal or different competences) or tools (media and artefacts such as
books, videos, movies, scientific equipment, software).
Aim of the project is to encourage the acquisition of knowledge and competences by

all community members. The following is a definition given by G. Trentin: "The
communities of learners have the objective of not only of increasing the knowledge
level but also of transforming students into teachers capable to use learning
strategies and methodologies of higher leve,l that is those typical of people who are
well familiar with a certain subject and are capable to explain it and make it
accessible to others” (Brown, in the dossier Irre-Toscana).
COGNITIVE APPRENTICESHIP
The cognitive apprenticeship model, developed above all others by Allan Collins, John
Seely Brown and Susan Newman, stems from the observation of the failure of
traditional schools which do not allow full command by the students of cognitive tools
used in teaching: the solution is found in the integration of formal education with
apprenticeship which was the dominating feature before compulsory education was
introduced.
Traditional apprenticeship employs four main strategies to promote export
competence:
• modelling - the apprentice observes and copies the master who shows him/her
how to work;
• coaching - the teacher assists the apprentice continuously, according to needs:
directs the apprentice’s attention towards a certain aspect, supplies the feedback,
facilitates work;
• scaffolding - this is a particular form of coaching: the teacher supplies a support
to the apprentice or encourages him/her, presets the work etc.;
• fading - the teacher gradually withdraws support progressively giving space to
more responsibilities.
Cognitive apprenticeship is different from traditional teaching because of the

attention given to the meta-cognitive dimension, to supervision and to context.

Other strategies are also introduced, such as articulation (students are encouraged to
speak bout their experience); reflection (students compare their problems with those
of an expert; exploration (students are encouraged to pose and solve problems).
ACTIVE LEARNING ON THE WEB
ACTIVE LEARNING SEEN AS E-LEARNING
DEFINITION OF E-LEARNING
“The term E-learning defines the distance training/learning process (FaD) which uses
as main “tools” and “go-between” the modern communication and information
technologies (E=electronic), in particular Internet thus allowing to develop a open,
flexible and widespread learning environment (E-learning/Open learning).
Owing to the development of the Internet and digital technologies, the Web has
become a powerful tool for distance teaching and learning: it is a global medium,
interactive, dynamic, economic and democratic.
Internet allows the development of training methods “on demand” based on the
students’ needs. Many other terms beyond E-learning are used in referring to online
teaching activities: Web-Based Learning (WBL), Web Based Instruction (WBI), Web
Based Training (WBT), Internet Based Training (IBT), Distributed Learning (DL),
Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL), Distance Learning, Online Learning (OL), Mobile
Learning (or M-learning).
A short historical account: from first to third generation Distance learning

Distance learning includes all those educational and learning processes in which there
is no contemporaneous presence (both in terms of space and time) of teachers and

students. This wide concept of distance education can include any text writing/reading
experience lasting a certain length of time and born out of the author’s intuition to
educate the public.
In this perspective we could, with a certain emphasis, include a considerable part of
western literary production as examples of Distance education beginning with Hesiod’s
“Works and Days” and its technical precepts for agriculture and navigation, moving to
Cicero’s “Letters” and so on to the essays on Ethics and Politics written from the 1700s
to our days.
The passage from generic production of educational textbooks to paper methods of
Distance Training took place with the Industrial Revolution in the XIX century.
The reason was in the increased demand for training outside the usual school channels
and the new economic and material conditions ensuring the effectiveness and
convenience of distance communication giving it an ever increasing social relevance. In
fact, beginning in the mid 1800s the progress in printing techniques and in railway
transport made possible even at considerable distance the production and distribution
of printed courses and lectures, questionnaires and all other forms of printed matter
forming the didactic material which was used for a long time by the “Correspondence
School”, particularly in the Anglo Saxon countries.
The first known Correspondence School, the Sir Pitman Correspondence College, was
founded in England in 1840. During the same period Charles Toussaint and Gustav
Langenscheidt founded in Berlin (1856) a Correspondence School for Foreign
Languages. In order to bring education to populations spread over vast territories and
reachable with great difficulty, in 1889 the Queensland University of Australia started a
series of correspondence courses and between the end of the 19th century and the
beginning of the 1990s the Saskatchewan University of Canada offered a range of
training courses over a good part of the Northern Territory.
However, the higher level of diffusion was reached in the US where in 1874 the Illinois
Wesleyan University of Bloomington organised university courses completely by
correspondence. This initiative was followed in 1883 by the foundation of the
Correspondence University at Ithaca (New York). In 1890 the American Society for the
Extension of the University teaching was founded in Philadelphia with the objective of
extending education to the more disadvantaged classes and, the following year,
correspondence university courses began in the University of Wisconsin.


A crucial moment was when the discoveries in telecommunications such as the
telephone and the radio could be used alongside the printed production thus
enormously increasing the possibility of didactic interaction.
Since 1927, in Great Britain the BBC organises radio programmes integrating the
normal school courses. During the following ten years a number of similar initiatives
were launched: in 1935 the Farm Radio Forum of the Extension department of the St.
François Xavier University in Canada, soon followed by many private radios, launched a
series of learning courses for workers such as the Revil Rural for farmers; in 1939 the
Iowa University (US) offered a telephone tutoring service to those students who had
difficulty in attending the lessons. Soon after WWII, thanks to the economic boom in
the Western countries, the invention and development of audio-visual media and the
mass diffusion of radios, record players and household appliances in general, brouight
about the passage from the first generation distance training to the second - also
called multi-media generation since sound and visual recording became available side
by side with the printed production (in the 1970s and 1980s with the invention of the
computer specific programmes became available).
The number of users of correspondence courses increased rapidly; in some countries
institutions such as the British Open University (1969) completely dedicated work to
Distance Learning. The Open University model was exported in the whole world (the
Nordisk Korrespondance Institutt in Norway, the Hagen Fernuniversitat in the Germany
Federal Republic, the Universidad Nacional de Education a Distancia in Spain, the
Research and Training Centre at the University of Helsinki).
Even though the second generation Distance education based on the estensive use of
didactic material (traditional printed courses for lectures, videorecording,
didactic/multimedia software) represents a further step forward from the first
generation it was limited to being only a provider of the service: teachers and
studenrts remained isolated from one another and so was for studentas and students,
apart from occasional face-to-face meetings (when programmed). Learning was
therefore still an andividual process and not a social one. The third generation (E-
learning) is instead based on computer and telecom techniques, thus transforming
learning into a social process.


Through the use of tools such as the Comnputer Mediated Communication or the
Computer Conferency System (email, chalines, forums, video-conference etc) there is
active interaction between users bringing about experience sharing and the acquisition
of new comptences (this is the moment of connection between Thrid generation
Distance learning and Cooperartive learning).
The technological progress of the last ten years has given simulation a place of great
importance in the FaD strategies; the high level of interactivity has increased the level
of learning without the mediation of language. However, owing to the high degree of
innovation and sophistication of technical supports and of software, these experiences
are still very limited and used on an experimental level.
The link between third generation Distance learning, Cooperative Learning and Active
Learning is established by the online use of simulation/Goal Based Scenarios/Role
Playing and Social Learning Networking under the “modelling” form.
Main interaction tools in E-learning

- Synchonous tools
These allow simultaneous communication between two or more people and have the
advantage of ereasing distances (also trans-oceanic ones) and of reducing costs.
Synchronous tools are:
• Internet rely chat - this allows real time conversation amongst users far away
from each other by text messages sent via computer
• VideoConference
• “Synchronous Forum” - this is smilar to the rely chat. Conversations are

structured and organised by specific topics and interest groups
• Live web assistant - this is an interface system communicating with the users
and answering their questions in real time
- Asynchronous tools
These allow non-synchronous communication between users and are:
• E-mail (electronic mail) - all post messages sent via internet.
• Document sharing, electronic-repository and file/sharing - digital spaces in

which files can be added, consulted and read.

• “Asynchronous Forum”, similar to the “Synchronous Forum” - message sending
is not subordinated to established times, users have free access and can
exchange information or consult the space if the subject treated is of interest.
Messages are open to anyone and contributions can be added just like with a
note board. A Forum is not just a space were messages are exchanged but is a
proper “meeting point” based on interaction.
E-learning and the evolution of the Internet: the WEB 2.0

“Web 2.0” or “Internet 2.0” is an evolution of the Internet (in particular of the World
Wide Web), compared to the 1990s Web 1.0.
Web 2.0 includes all online applications allowing high interaction between users and
between users and website (blogs, forums, chat lines, Wikipedia, YouTube, Facebook,
Myspace, Gmail etc). Web 2.0 is above all a philosophical approach to the Web
emphasising its social dimension and not only its mere use. It uses the same
technology as Web 1.0 (TCP/TP) and the same tools but the innovation is that it is
focused on contents, information and interaction. It is a space based on co-presence
where the users can create or change the various multimedia contents
ACTIVE LEARNING AS SOCIAL LEARNING NETWORK
FROM SOCIAL LEARNING AND SOCIAL NETWORK TO SOCIAL LEARNING NETWORK
SOCIAL LEARNING
From the theory of social learning to cognitivism

The social learning theory represents one of the very first observations on this subject
by the Canadian psychologist Albert Bandura (1925-). He has noted how the learning
process in individuals is not exclusively related to the direct relationship subject/object


but also to in direct experiences developed through the observation of behaviour and
actions of other people.
Bandura used the term “modelling” to define the learning process of an observing
individual that changes according to the behaviour of another person acting as “model”.
Bandura has carried out studies on aggressive behaviour in children observing a model
(the “Bobo” doll experiment).
The identification of the learner with the model is considered key for observative
learning and the higher is the level of identification the more effective will be the result.
Bandura’s reflections on “perceived self-efficacy” i.e. the individual’s belief in his skill to
organise and carry out the actions necessary to reach a given target marks the end
point of the theories on social learning and the standing point of the Social Cognitive
learning theory (1997).
Bandura detatches from his first behavioural approaches to define and build an approach
towards the cognitive processes and to the study of the individual in the environment.
The concept of “percieved self-efficacy” is strongly linked to “human agency” recognising
it as the ability of the individual to actively work in a specific context. Agency is a human
function regarding both single individuals and groups, and it can be decsribed as the skill
to generate specific actions in order to gain a result. In evaluating the role of
intentionality Bandura separates the ways an individual uses to achieve a result from the
effects these produce.
Agency is considered a function related to intentional acts, regardless of their outcome.
The study of this process is based on the assumption that it is possible to have an effect
on events.
Bandura’s approach accepts that human behaviour is mainly determined by many
interacting factors such as the following:
1. interior personal factors. Cognitive, sentimental, biological;
2. behaviour arising from particular situations;
3. environmental factors determining individuality and behaviour.
Human actions are determined by a number of interdependent causes involving the

three factors described above. The influence of those factors varies according to the
individual’s activity, circumstances and the length of time necessary for an element to
develop its effects. Bandura theorises that a central value determining change and


development in human behaviour is the social system and that therefore actions are
influenced by social and structural circumstances.
In this situation human beings are at the same time the producers and the product of
the social system determining their behaviour, in fact the social structures having the
scope of organising and regulating human activities have been established by the same
people who are part of them.
These structures set up obligations and supply resources for the development of
individuals and groups belonging to them a s well as a series of shared practices
whereas within their guidelines there is wide space for free will in their application.
Bandura also noted that individuals more inclined to action know how to take advantage
of the opportunities offered by social structures and how to circumvent their restrictions
whereas inefficient people are less able to exploit the resources and become discouraged
when faced with problems created by the social system.
DEFINITION OF SOCIAL NETWORK

A Social Network is composed of any group of people (social actors) connected by social
links (definite relationships) ranging from casual acquaintance to work and family. The
term is used as a “category” or “interpretative metaphor” in social studies such as
sociology, psychology or cultural anthropology. The online version of Social network is
one of the most evolved forms of Web communication.
Through the Internet and its technology the network of social relations we build up day
after day almost casually can be organised, consulted and enriched by new contacts.
The phenomenon of online Social networks was developed in the US around three main
themes: profession, friendship and love, and has since developed exponentially thanks
to websites like Friendster, Tribe.net and LinkedIn. From then onwards the most
important search engines have started to develop and implement their own online
networks: Google launched ORKUL in January 2004 and the Spanish/Portuguese
language KIBOP began in the same year, the first Italian portal with its own social
network was Supereva. According to the article “How Netlog Leaps Language barriers”
published on the Wall Stree Journal the 1st November 2007 the most clicked on social
networks are Myspace and Facebook with 107 and 73 million users respectively.
Further steps forward have been made by semantic social networks which connect both
individuals and weblogs such as StumbleUpon and Funchain.


In these cases the web is a kind of hybrid between a social network and an “aggregator”
i.e. a website allowing blog authors to publicise their posts. The use of social networks is
becoming widespread as an evolution of online radios.
The websites do not propose only music in MP3 format, they interpret also the tastes of
the users in this way new artists and their music can be discovered. Through websites
such as Pandora, lastfm and musicovery.com it is possible to create communities inviting
one’s own friends to join in and share other users’ taste in music.
Social networks can be businesslike too or develop around a certain specific territory
such as those about culture, free time and a specific town.
Social networks and community networking are creating a new way of working towards
a sustainable growth.
Social network analysis
Social Network Analysis (SNA) is a theoretical and methodological study of social
networks (also called net work theory) and is a branch of network analysis. It is a recent
method of analysis of social relations born and developed out of two main lines: the
anthropological school of Manchester founded by a group of researchers around 1940
(C. Mitchell, J. Barnes, E. Bott, V Turner) associate members of the Rhodes-Livingstone
Institute of Lusaka in Central Africa established in 1938, directed by Gluckman between
1941 and ’47, which studied “in situation” processes; the second line is the American
structured analysis, developed in the 1970s at Harvard University by a group of scholars
(Scott, Granovetter, Burt, Wellman, Berkowitz) lead by Harrison White whose priority
interest was in the network society, considered an extended and structured relationship
network. The basic assumption is that every individual (actor) relates with the others
and this kind of interaction moulds and modifies the behaviour of both. Main aim is to
define and analyse the ties between individuals (nodes). There are several classes
available in literature regarding the study of network properties (cohesion, centrality),
the research on specific sub-nets (groups, egonet) and on similarities among the
networks (structural equivalence, automorfica and regular).
DEFINITION OF SOCIAL LEARNING NETWORK

Social network identifies a group of people, constantly interacting with one another,
pursuing a common objective. The online Social Learning Networks are the latest
generation of digital platform and interfaces (web 2.0) in possess of all the key web


tools for communication and interaction usable only for education purposes. An example
is the open source ELLG system having specific functions typical of online social
networks such as a third generation learning space:
1. management of personal and users’ community blogs (weblog function). Other basic
functions are a personal web space usable for reflections and story telling, an automatic
aggregator of other personal blogs; supports for podcasting/video/photosharing;
2. file organising and sharing (file repository) set up as a personal record office freely
shareable;
3. creating and managing of Internet communities (Social networking); possibly for
users to set up own contact network as well as create own open or closed communities.
ELLG is equipped with a tagging system and a structure allowing access to its contents
by specific authorisation. Each new online resource is available through a RSS feed.


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1.

Definition of the four key elements in order to investigate Web Based

ACTIVE LEARNING: A METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH..

WHAT IS ACTIVE LEARNING

“Active Learning” is an umbrella term describing the teaching approach popularised

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E. Claparède (1873-1940), psychology scholar and professor at the University of

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ACTIVE LEARNING SEEN AS LEARNING BY DOING

DEFINITION OF LEARNING BY DOING

If we limit our study to the “interaction” concept in a practical and material

“Active Learning/Learning by doing” is also decribed as a combination of techniques

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 PEER TEACHING/COOPERATIVE LEARNING (SEE SPECIFIC PARAGRAPH)

PROJECT WORK: this is a professional project implemented by the trainees at

• Warming up: through specific techniques (sketches, interviews,

• Action: the students must identify themselves in different roles and

• Analsys: analysis, comments and debates on what has happened

 SIMULATION/GOAL-BASED-SCENARIOS; a real life situation is artificially created. The

 DRAMA: STAGING A PROPER CONTEXTUALISED THEATRE ACTIVITY.

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 PROBLEM SOLVING: is the process through which problems are analysed,

ACTIVE LEARNING AS COOPERATIVE LEARNING

DEFINITION OF COOPERATIVE LEARNING

According to Johnson, Johnson and Smith (1991) “Cooperative Learning” is a

1. Positive interdependence. Members are encouraged to establish a type of

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2. Face-to-face promotional interaction. Although part of the work can be assigned

Models and characteristics of contemporary Cooperative Learning.

The best known models are the following:

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• R.E. Slavin’s Student “Team Learning” emphasises the importance of extrinsic

'Learning Together' is based on the awareness and knowledge of three dynamics in

1. individual learning/individualistic form

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• each students works individually;

2. THE “COMPETITIVE” FORM

• the competition takes place between members of equal skills belonging to

• the groups are separated from one another;

• the material is structured in a cooperative form when the groups work

3. THE “COOPERATIVE” FORM

• groups composed of 3 to 6 students, preferably mixed.

• accommodation in a semi-circular classroom so that the participants may

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• clear explanation of the task: objectives, contents, activity, assessment

• work must be carried out according to established rules.

1. Positive Interdependence, where the students are committed to the

• decide before the lessons begins;

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2. Informal Cooperative Learning

3. Cooperative basic groups