TRANSFERENCE OF COOPERATIVE LEARNING EXPERIENCES FROM THE UNIVERSITY TO SECONDARY EDUCATION

The introduction of new teaching methodologies in the teaching-learning process is justified as it promotes student learning and academic achievement. In recent years cooperative learning has become important as a form of collective acquisition of skills , each member of a team is responsible not only for learning what is taught but also for helping teammates learn.
According to Gil (2010) cooperative learning is define as a learning process based on group work, collective construction of knowledge and the development of mixed abilities (learning and personal and social development) where students take responsibility for their own learning and that of their peers.
Previous empirical research shows that university students improve their learning outcomes after the use of this learning strategy. This research is the result of an exercise in transferring knowledge and experience of the implementation of this methodology at the university level to the implementation of cooperative learning as a tool for theoretical and practical on secondary education.
To this end, we analysed the results obtained from a sample of pupils of secondary education using a sample of 208 students from three different high schools of Murcia and analysed their academic results in the fields of Economics, Philosophy and Citizenship, and History, first by the traditional education system, and secondly, through the implementation of cooperative learning. The working team was integrated by secondary school teachers and The Teaching Innovation Group (IDEE) establish at the University of Murcia since 2009.
The results show a higher pass rate in the assessment of those issues that have developed in class through cooperative learning. Specifically, a 90.38% compared to 50%. In addition, the average rating was also higher, 6.71 on 10 versus 4.70 out of 10, these differences were significant (t-statistic of 7.384 for the mean difference test).
In conclusion, the results of the implementation of cooperative learning in secondary schools show an improvement of the students in the process of acquiring skills.