People Skills: Launching a Cooperative Learning Team

In a recent guest column, the benefits of using cooperative learning methods to help students acquire people (process) skills while they learn were discussed. The fundamental building block of the active learning method is the cooperative learning team. Each learning team consists of a small number of students who share responsibility for actively leading and supporting each other in the learning process. Knowing how important the process of forming groups is to team building, I decided to write this article to provide teachers and students with some process guidelines from the discipline of group management and team development to help them launch their cooperative learning teams as quickly, easily, and effectively as possible.