GROUP investigation is a cooperative learning strategy that places students in groups to investigate a given topic, like other cooperative learning strategies, it uses student’s help and cooperation as a major learning vehicle. Unlike other strategies, its primary focus is the investigation of a specific subject or topic.
Group investigation traces its roots to several earlier educational thinkers; John Dewey (1916) viewed the classroom as a microcosm for society.
Schools needed to help students learn to work together on meaningful projects so that they could do the same in society. The teachers’ role in this process was to help students identify and solve problems that were meaningful to them. Group investigation can help reach this goal.
Herbert Shelen (1960) was another educator who influenced the development of the Group- Investigation Model. Shelen stressed the importance of active inquiry in student learning.
He felt that learning will be most effective when it involved the search for an answer to some question or problem. Group investigation provides an opportunity for students to pursue meaningful questions in groups of their peers.
Teachers who use group investigation have at least three interrelated goals, first, group investigation helps students learn how to investigate topics systematically and analytically. A goal similar to those reached with the General and Such man Inquiry Models. This results in the development of inquiry skills and it helps reach a second goal, which is the deep understanding of content. Third and perhaps most important, students learn how to work cooperatively towards the solution of a problem. Thus it is valuable like the skill and unfortunately one that students don’t often practice in our schools.
Group investigation provides teachers with one instructional strategy to reach all three goals – inquiry, content learning and learning to work cooperatively.
By: Ms. Amelinda A. Fandialan | SSPI | Lamao National High School
