Development of Cooperative Learning Behavior in Chinese Children aged 5-6 years by Constructing Activities with the Theme of Scaffolding

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to explore whether the themed constructive activity
supported by the strategic scaffolding instruction could improve the cooperative learning
behavior of Chinese children aged 5-6 years. Based on the quasi-experimental research
method, there are total 50 children from two classes of senior grade of a kindergarten in
Haikou, Hainan Province, China as objects, divided into 2 groups of 25 each and grouped as
experimental and control. The experiment lasted for 4 weeks. Taking the tool of "Observation
Scale of Group Cooperative Learning Effect for Senior Class Children", including five aspects
of common goal, labor division, source sharing, cooperation and individual contribution, the
study compared the data respectively taking from before and after the experiment and
analyses the independent sample test and covariance. The results show that behavior of
experimental group is significantly better than that in the control group, indicating that the
constructive activity based on scaffolding instruction could improve the cooperative learning
behavior for Chinese children aged 5 - 6 years old and play a positive role in future
educational activities.