A Comparison of the Effects of Cooperative and Competitive Methods as Reinforcement of the Skill of Answering Inferential Questions in a Fifth Grade Reading Class

Abstract

This study investigated whether a practice session in the previously learned skill of reading a paragraph and answering inferential comprehension questions was more effective when conducted competitively or cooperatively. One fifth-grade homeroom class of 28 students was randomly divided into two groups: a cooperative group and a competitive group, each containing students from three different reading levels. A researcher-made pretest determined that there was no significant difference between the two groups before the treatment. A practice session was conducted in which the cooperative group worked in units of two or three. Each student in the unit was given an ‘A’ if his/her unit achieved the criterion of 8 out of 10 correct answers. The competitive group worked on its own and a prize was given for the highest score. A posttest was given the next week. A comparison of the posttest scores of the competitive and cooperative groups was made with a t-test for independent measures. It was found that there was no significant difference between the mean posttest score of the competitive group and the mean posttest score of the cooperative group.