This study compares the learning results of three groups of secondary two (grade eight) students of a similar academic standard who participated in a teaching intervention involving different pedagogies. One hundred and forty-nine Hong Kong secondary students were chosen and divided into three groups, “whole-class teaching approach”, “group work with no specific strategies” and “group work with effective strategies”, to study the “space travel” unit in their science curriculum. The first group was exposed to traditional whole-class instruction, and the latter two practised collaborative group work, with the third adopting four effective strategies derived from a UK-based quasi-experimental project. Analyses of the pre- and post-diagnostic assessments and audiotaped discussions revealed that group work comprising effective strategies not only raised students’ test scores, but also enhanced their joint construction of conceptual knowledge in science. The findings suggest that the effective strategies adopted in this study are contributory factors to superior student accomplishments and a stronger desire to seek clarification accruing from shared cognitive activities.
[Copyright of International Journal of Science & Mathematics Education is the property of Springer Netherlands. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10763-017-9839-x]

This paper, through discussion of a teaching intervention at two secondary schools in Hong Kong, demonstrates the learning advancement brought about by group work and dissects the facilitating role of teachers in collaborative discussions. One-hundred and fifty-two Secondary Two (Grade 8) students were divided into three pedagogical groups, namely "whole-class teaching", "self-directed group work" and "teacher-supported group work"groups, and engaged in peer-review, team debate, group presentation and reflection tasks related to a junior secondary science topic (i.e. current electricity). Pre- and post-tests were performed to evaluate students' scientific conceptions, alongside collected written responses and audio-recorded discussions. The results indicate that students achieved greater cognitive growth when they engaged in cooperative learning activities, the interactive and multi-sided argumentative nature of which is considered to apply particularly well to science education and Vygotsky's zone of proximal development framework. Group work learning is also found to be most effective when teachers play a role in navigating students during the joint construction of conceptual knowledge.
[Copyright of International Journal of Science Education is the property of Routledge]