EFFECTIVE LEARNING OF ENGLISH GRAMMAR THROUGH TEAMWORK

The learning experience reported on in this research was initially designed to enhance student involvement in class activities in an English grammar university module (Landa 2008, 2010). A quantitative analysis of data gathered over a period of four years showed that students seem to perform better when teamwork is part of the class's approach to learning/teaching and that the percentage of students sitting the exam gradually increases as this type of activity is introduced as part of the course training tasks. In the present paper, these results are first confirmed by the analysis of data from a fifth year of application of the methodology. The quantitative outcomes are then compared with data obtained from both open- and closed-ended activity assessment tasks throughout the whole five-year period with the purpose of gauging the success of the learning experience. A qualitative analysis of both types of data flags up several indications that the cooperative tasks carried out in this English grammar module are conducive to a successful type of learning that can be attested beyond exam results. Besides discussing several signs of the effectiveness of this type of methodology, this paper also the biggest challenges in the cooperative learning process, such as minimizing shirking in teamwork.