The University of Texas at Austin
Mission to Mars

Cooperative Terms

The Cooperative Teams phase is a natural progression from the Problem Generation phase. The categories that were developed during the Problem Generation phase and the subsequent questions the students generated and choose are the initial seeds for the Cooperative Teams phase. For instance, Onboard Resources could have been a category with questions such as "How much fuel will we need" or "How much and what type of food should we bring". These questions will drive the research for the next couple of weeks. Hopefully, the students will have some interest in the topic since they either were the ones who a) originally asked the question or b) found the Team focus to be of some interest to them. Again, in this phase, teacher intuitions in terms of group setup, personalities and interests come into play.

Some Background

This aspect of THE BASIC MODEL concerns itself with group learning. To better acquaint ourselves with group learning, it is important to differentiate certain forms of group learning. Marcia Linn, a professor in the Department of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education at the University of California at Berkeley, breaks down Group Learning into three components, cooperative learning, collaborative learning and tutored learning. For The Basic Model and especially the Cooperative Teams aspect of the curriculum to work well, all three methods should be used.

Cooperative Learning: involves dividing a task into parts and having each group member complete one of its parts.

Collaborative Learning: this occurs when two or more students are asked to jointly work out a single solution to a specific problem.

Tutored Learning: this occurs when one student helps another gain expertise; usually, it's the person doing the tutoring who is more expert at a method for fostering learning in the student being tutored.

It is both possible and advisable to design activities that combine more than one of these types of group learning activities within the Mission to Mars unit. Also, through the use of outside experts, or electronic communications, what we define as "members of the group" can be largely expanded, although caution and discretion must always be employed by the classroom teacher.


Classroom Tips
A key obstacle to overcome in the Cooperative Teams aspect of THE BASIC MODEL is providing the students with needed resources for conducting their research. Keep in mind, the final product of the students efforts will be the Feasibility Study. The Cooperative Teams segment of the unit provides the students with much of their initial exposure to deepening content as well as methods of conducting effective research. A number of resources can and should be utilized during this phase of the unit. Making use of multiple sources of information for the students has proven to be a very effective method of conveying the Mission to Mars unit in the past. Some examples follow:

1) Classroom Library: A classroom library of resources is very valuable for quick reference work as well as some more in depth topics on the Mission to Mars unit. Please refer to the Appendix of the curriculum for some helpful ideas by clicking here.

2) The School Library: Ideally, the school librarian can be a very effective member of the research group as they prepare resources for the children based on their own individual group or classroom needs. In the past, we have found school librarians to be an invaluable resource.

3) The Mission to Mars Webliographer: By using the Internet, children are exposed to a wealth of information. Unfortunately, most times this information is not easily found nor has the classroom teacher been able to preview the material. To help address that issue, we have developed a useful classroom tool for navigating the Internet for use during the Mission to Mars unit. To access Webliographer, click here.

4) CSILE: For classes so equipped, CSILE has been an invaluable tool at helping teachers scaffold the learning of their children. It has also been very effective at helping groups work together on related topics. In our experience, there is much overlap in terms of students research. Once it is know what topics each group is researching, the classroom begins to share reference, graphics, books, articles etc.

5) Television shows: Periodically, educational programs appear on television. These videos (usually you can legally tape them for educational use for a time period not to exceed 1 year) usually make wonderful resources for the classroom.

6) Outside Experts: From time to time, opportunities to make outside experts from the community available for "benchmark" lessons may be appropriate and can assist students greatly in developing a well thought out plan for their research.

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