Student-Student and Student-Teacher Interactions through the Jigsaw II Method in the Teaching of the Economics Subject in Secondary Education

Abstract

Peer interactions and teacher student interactions are essential components of learning upon which cooperative learning (CL) is rooted. Empirical data about this type of interactions are scanty. The aim of this research is to compare students' opinions about the student-student and student-teacher interactions in a CL method (Jigsaw II/puzzle) and the conventional teacher learning method after learning an economics teaching unit in a secondary education school. The study was carried out in a secondary education level institute in the island of Tenerife, Canary Islands (Spain) during the 2017-2018 academic year. Twenty-eight students took part in the study. Students were taught a unit through the conventional teacher exposition method and later through a CL technique (Jigsaw II/puzzle). Peer interactions and teacher-student interaction were evaluated through a 5-point Likertscale. Students were evaluated twice, during the conventional instruction and approximately two weeks later after receiving the CL instruction. The total score of interactions among peers was significantly higher with the CL method than the conventional method (conventional method: 19.92 ± 2.26 vs CL method: 21.54 ± 2.75, p < 0.009). There were no significant differences between the methods of learning in the total score of the interaction with the teacher (conventional method: 17.17±1.61 vs CL method: 16.37±2.78, p < 0.098), but in item 9 (interchange of information with the teacher) the score in conventional method was significantly higher than in the CL technique (4.50 ± 0.59 vs 4.21 ± 0.72, p < 0.016). In conclusion, the secondary education students consider that puzzle/jigsaw II CL technique promotes relationships among peers more than conventional learning while there is no difference between the puzzle/jigsaw II CL technique and the conventional learning in the teacher-student relationships.

Incorporating Jigsaw Strategy to Support Students’ Learning through Action Research

“…The use of cooperative learning strategies could assist students in the development of the 21 st Century skills that comprised of collaboration, creativity, critical thinking and communication skills (Lai & Viering, 2012). There are several cooperative learning strategies available in the literature, such as think-pair-share, thinking-aloud pair problem solving, the three-step interview, STAD (Student Teams Achievement Division), Jigsaw, TGT (Teams Games Tournaments) and GI (Group Investigation) (Astarini et al, 2019;Azmin, 2016;Benek & Bezir Akcay, 2019;Damit et al, 2015;Duraman et al, 2015;Halimah & Sukmayadi, 2019;Kani & Shahrill, 2015;Lee et al, 2018;Lim et al, 2016;Mahari et al, 2019;Morera-Fernandez et al, 2020;Simpol et al, 2018;Sulaiman & Shahrill, 2015;Vijayan et al, 2016). Cooperative in general is defined as providing group work where everyone participates on a collective task to help each other in completing the task provided to them by the teacher (Barron & Hammond, 2008).…”

“…Jigsaw is one of the strategies of cooperative learning as it exercises the effort of working in teams for each of the students by reaching a favorable outcome (Halimah & Sukmayadi, 2019;Morera-Fernandez et al, 2020;Qiao & Jin, 2010;Vijayan et al, 2016). Jigsaw is formed when each student in a team becomes responsible for teaching other peers through a set of learnt materials (Ledlow, 1996).…”