Cooperative learning and the appropriation of procedural knowledge by primary school children

This paper analyses the development and promotion of self-regulatory strategies for comprehending and learning from text in primary school children (9 years old), using cooperative learning. Experimental and Control Groups were compared for their comprehension of narrative and expository texts: the first was exposed to repeated reading experiences within cooperative learning teams as part of regular classes and using official programs-texts; the Control Group followed regular classroom activities. The Experimental Group showed a marked development of strategies for dealing with texts in comparison with the Control Group. Cooperative learning promoted the acquisition of procedural knowledge (strategies) for processing narrative and expository texts. These strategies do not seem to be promoted adequately by regular classroom activities.