ABSTRACT

This article reports the findings from a study that explored children’s interactions and their perceptions of working in groups in a primary classroom. Group work among children has been researched widely to highlight its efficacy in influencing children’s cognitive and social learning in mainstream classrooms. Such research, however, appears to ignore children’s own perspectives, and thus may contribute only slightly to presenting a true picture of children’s thinking and their experiences of working with others during their routinely organized group work. This small-scale study was conducted with twenty-seven 9- to 10-year-old children studying in Year Five. Using ethnographic research design, unstructured participant observations were used to study children’s interactions, and informal conversational interviews were held with children to listen to their perspectives. The data gathered through observations and interviews were analyzed qualitatively. This article reports findings from the interview data and provides insight on what children think of group work, how children experience group work, and how children want to see group work in the future. With these findings, the article highlights the importance of listening to children’s perspectives by practitioners, researchers, and policymakers when organizing group work in the mainstream classrooms.

摘要

本文报告了一项研究的结果，该研究探讨了儿童的互动以及他们对小学课堂小组工作的看法。儿童之间的小组工作已被广泛研究，以突出其在主流课堂中影响儿童认知和社交学习的功效。然而，这样的研究似乎忽略了儿童自己的观点，因此可能对呈现儿童的思维和他们在例行组织的小组工作中与他人合作的经历的真实情况略有贡献。这项小规模研究是针对 27 名 9 至 10 岁在五年级学习的儿童进行的。使用民族志研究设计，非结构化的参与者观察被用来研究儿童的互动，与儿童进行了非正式的对话式访谈，以听取他们的观点。通过观察和访谈收集的数据进行了定性分析。本文报告了访谈数据的结果，并提供了有关儿童对小组工作的看法、儿童如何体验小组工作以及儿童希望将来如何看待小组工作的见解。通过这些发现，本文强调了在主流课堂中组织小组工作时从业者、研究人员和政策制定者听取儿童观点的重要性。以及孩子们希望将来如何看待小组工作。通过这些发现，本文强调了在主流课堂中组织小组工作时从业者、研究人员和政策制定者听取儿童观点的重要性。以及孩子们希望将来如何看待小组工作。通过这些发现，本文强调了在主流课堂中组织小组工作时从业者、研究人员和政策制定者听取儿童观点的重要性。