LITERATURE REVIEW

Collaborative learning is the process whereby each member contributes personal experience, information, perspective, insight, skills and attitudes with the intent of improving the learning accomplishments of others. Collaborative learning occurs when small groups of learners help each other learn. In many situations group learning tends to be used in an informal, unstructured, and loosely monitored way. Collaborative learning requires that each member of the group contribute to the group performance, it does not mean that each member of the group can attach their name to an assignment completed by individual members of the group. (Slavin, 1989)
For collaborative learning to be effective, the instructor must view teaching as a process of developing and enhancing students' ability to learn. The instructor's role is not to transmit information, but to serve as a facilitator for learning. This involves creating and managing meaningful learning experiences and stimulating students' thinking through real world problems.
My game had, in many ways incorporated the collaborative learning whereby students were put into small groups. They were asked to describe a picture clearly and come out with a sculpture similar to the picture given. Every member in the group played an important role to produce an end product, which was an animal sculpture. Some were in charged of describing the picture as clearly as possible while the rest had to visualise the picture described and molded the plastercine into a perfect sculpture. I only acted as a facilitator and allowed enough space for the students to work on their own. Marks given were based on the group performance as a whole.
According to Johnson and Johnson (1986), there is persuasive evidence that cooperative teams achieve at higher levels of thought and retain information longer than students who work quietly as individuals. The shared learning gives students an opportunity to engage in discussion, take responsibility for their own learning, and thus become critical thinkers (Totten, Sills, Digby, & Russ, 1991). Critical-thinking items involve analysis, synthesis, and evaluation of the concepts. The game that I had implemented required students to be critical thinkers when they had to analyse the picture. One wrong move, the sculpture would be distorted too.
Howard Gardner claims that all human beings have multiple intelligences. These multiple intelligences can be nurtured and strengthened, or ignored and weakened. We can improve education by addressing the multiple intelligences of our students. These intelligences are located in different areas of the brain and can either work independently or together. Through my game, students had the chance to develop Visual-Spatial Intelligence which is the capacity to think in images and pictures, to visualize accurately and abstractly. Students had hands-on experience when they had to design the plastercines. Studies show that many students who perform poorly on traditional tests are turned on to learning when classroom experiences incorporate artistic, athletic, and musical activities.
Experiencial learning is a type of learning in which students are doing something - not just thinking about something. The experiential learning cycle integrates 1) concrete experiences, 2) reflective observations about the experiences, 3) generalizations about experiences and observations (abstract conceptualizations), and 4) active experimentations with the abstract concepts (Claxton 1987). The same goes with my game. The game required students to “do something” and made use of their experiences or background knowledge. They had to come out with suitable vocabulary in describing the picture precisely.

REFERENCES

1. Anuradha A. Gokhale. (1995). Journal of Technology Education. Vol 7, no 1.
2. Claxton, C. and P. Murrell. (1987). Learning Styles: Implications for Improving Educational Practices. ASHE-ERIC Higher Education Report No. 4. Washington, D.C.: The George Washington University, Graduate School of Education.
3. Gardner, H. (1993a). Multiple Intelligences: The Theory in Practice. NY: Basic Books.
4. Johnson, R. T., & Johnson, D. W. (1986). Action research: Cooperative learning in the science classroom. Science and Children, 24, 31-32.
5. Slavin, R. E. (1989). Research on cooperative learning: An international perspective. Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research, 33(4), 231-243.
6. Totten, S., Sills, T., Digby, A., & Russ, P. (1991). Cooperative learning: A guide to research. New York: Garland.