What is collaboration and how can collaboration skills be developed in primary education? 

Collaboration is defined as an “Active engagement and interaction among group members to achieve a common goal.” Although this definition does in fact share features with previous formulations, for example interaction and common goals. (Dillenbourg et al. 1996; Krischner et al. 2009).Collaboration within learning has become popular in the 21stcentury due to the need for society to work together have increased (Austin, 2000), even though it is a trend that has increased in the 21stcentury, Lloyd and Beard (1995) suggest that working in collaboration with others is no a new idea in education, so teachers should be incorporating it into their teaching. Collaboration is about being part of a team, Donaldson incorporates collaboration in the Good teaching and learning encourages collaboration section of the new curriculum which states “ the ability to function effectively as a member of a team is one of the key skills regularly citied by employers as essential in modern workplace and is an important feature of the Reviews Proposal.” This suggests that employers are not only looking for grades and qualifications, they also looking for life skills like working together and as a team because It is a massive skill that is used in nearly every job, so it is just as important as any other subject or skill. (Donalson, 2015).  Collaborative working incorporates language in learning, from working together in a group or as a team you are communicating and talking to each other which is the main part of education, Lloyd & Beard, 1995) states “Talk Is vitally important to learning,it is the toolwhich we use to interpret, communicate, work through and make sense of our experiences”, this means that working and communicating as a team can actually help you problem solve effectively. Barnes (1976) believes that communication is the “heart of education”. In education teachers will teach their pupils but not all the time they will understand what they are learning, by working in groups collaboratively they can talk to each other and explain and talk through what they are learning together through experiences and it will help the pupil’s themselves understand what they are learning, Garvey (1984) explains this concept and how important it is “What others first did for the child and the child next learned to do for himself, speaking aloud as did others, he has now learned to do for himself”. Teachers have to incorporate this learning method of having children explain to each other aloud for understanding in their lessons, it will only take a few minutes to complete and it will be beneficial to the pupil’s. Children in school can not only learn from the teacher, through discussion with each other Barnes and Todd argue that ‘by setting aside the traditional teaching model learning becomes a social experience, putting pupils into situations where they will be confronted with opposing views requiring negotiation and learning that perhaps others’ viewpoints may be just as valid as their own’ (1977, p. 127). A simple way to bring collaborative work into teaching is simply by having the children work in pairs, Kutnick & Thomas (1990) discovered that pupils just working in pairs rather than on their own improved upon initial performance and it did not matter if they were placed in equal or unequal matched pairings, the results were still the same. Reynolds (1994) states the three reasons for using groups:
·     Motivational 
·     Educational 
·     Ideological  
Motivational is the point where the children are getting involved in activities and enjoying themselves. They enjoy themselves by playing games and using simulations because it makes learning more memorable because they are engaging with what they are learning, also by taking part in activities means that it is not just the mind being involved it is also feelings and that makes what they are learning more likely to stick. Educational is the main part as it is believed that people can learn from one another not just by listening to the teacher as knowledge is constantly being adapted when working together as a social process. Ideological helps prepare children for society in the real world as it helps develop individuals to be able to live and work participatively. As technology is becoming the main part of teaching in the curriculum today and using technology is a way of bringing collaboration into the classroom as there are so many technology platforms and apps that can be used to work together, for example skype, google hangouts, Goole Jamboard, Twitter, Padlet and Kahoot, all of these can be used effectively in the classroom incorporating collaboration at the same time, using these method makes learning more interactive and fun especially when using technology in a group or as a pair as it helps keep the pupil’s engaged. 



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