Small group and cooperative learning have gained much attention in recent decades because of their desirable effects on social, motivational and academic outcomes (e.g., Kyndt et al., 2013; Rohrbeck, et al., 2003). Constructivist and socio-constructivist theories of learning and development assume that cognitive conflict (Piaget), scaffolding, and co-construction of knowledge (Vygotsky), as exercised in small group work, improve learning. Allport’s contact hypothesis (1954) supports the assumption that group work can reduce prejudices and foster social integration. Although small group learning is theoretically and empirically well-founded, teachers do not use it regularly in their teaching (Buchs et al., 2017; Veenman et al., 2000; Veldman et al., 2020). Given this discrepancy between research and practice, it seems worthwhile to investigate teachers’ perspective on potential challenges and difficulties associated with the implementation of small group learning in their classrooms.

Previous studies found that even if teachers were trained and willing to implement small group learning, many of them experienced substantial difficulties. In particular, teachers identified long preparation times, tight time schedules, lacking student competencies and classroom control as major challenges associated with group work (Buchs et al., 2017; Celik, Aytin & Bayram, 2013; Gillies & Boyle, 2010; Karmina, 2018; Völlinger et al., 2018). However, few of these studies have investigated untrained primary-school teachers and thereby used open-ended questions (e.g. in interviews) that allow an in-depth description of challenges and difficulties. Furthermore, the described studies did not analyze on which levels of the school system (Altrichter, et al. 2007; Fend, 2006) teachers perceived these challenges to be located; for example, time-related problems could either be interpreted as the results of lacking personal time management skills (level of individual teachers) or as the results of unrealistic curricular standards imposed by the educational system. Furthermore, more research is need in terms of which and how conflicting requirements concerning, for example, a teacher’s role during group work (e.g. be solely a guide on the side but still have control over student learning and classroom interaction), may be associated with the perception of group work as “difficult”. Although conflicting requirements have been described in the literature, few empirical studies exist that have investigated these conflicts from a teacher’s perspective. The present study intends to address these research gaps by analyzing interviews of primary school teachers where these teachers report on challenges, conflicting requirements and difficulties associated with small group work.

In particular, this study aims at answering the following research questions:

RQ1: What kind of challenges and difficulties do German primary school teachers associate with small group learning?

RQ2: On which levels of the school system do primary school teachers locate these difficulties?

RQ3: What kind of conflicting demands do primary school teachers point out concerning small group learning?

Fourteen primary school teachers (13 female; M = 9.7 [range: 2-27] years of teaching experience) participated in this study. We conducted semi-standardized interviews about small group learning. The interview included questions about the definition of group-work, its goals, the teachers’ usage of group-work as well as their experiences with, their role in and their perceived difficulties of group work. The interviews were transcribed and subsequently analysed using content analysis based on Mayring (2010). Four coders identified and agreed upon three broad initial topics raised by the teachers: difficulties associated with group work, goals of group work and teachers’ role in group work. This study mainly focuses on the first topic, the difficulties. The content-relevant text passages of all interviews were paraphrased and the paraphrases were assigned to one of the three main topics upon coder agreement. Based on the paraphrases, the three main topics were further sub-segmented into more fine-grained meaningful categories. Two trained coders independently assigned each paraphrase to one of these fine-grained categories. For the topic “difficulties associated with group work” nine categories were identified, which will we presented in the Conclusions (RQ1). Interrater-reliability was good (κ = .83). Finally, one of the two coders analysed the content-relevant text passages and paraphrases associated with difficulties in terms of their reference to a certain school system level (e.g. individual teacher level; individual school level; educational system as a whole; RQ2). Furthermore, conflicting demands associated with group work were identified based on the context-relevant text passages (RQ3). Key words pointing to conflicting demands were: balance, on the one hand, on the other hand, conflict. Both of these analyses were verified via communicative validation.

RQ1: This study identified nine categories of difficulties associated with small group work (1. lack of control, 2. preparation effort, 3. lacking student competencies, 4. heterogeneous class composition, 5. lack of subject/content compatibility, 6. time cost, 7. lacking teacher competencies, 8. inadequate resources at schools, 9. difficulties associated with assessment of learning outcomes) that are similar to those previous interview studies had identified in samples of (trained) secondary-school teachers. Over and above these previous studies, this study finds that some primary school teachers perceived small group work not to be equally well-suited for all subject areas. RQ2: This study is one of the first to explore and differentiate perceived difficulties according to school system levels. The teachers most often attributed the perceived difficulties to the method as such (e.g. group work just requires more preparation and time than other methods). However, some of the difficulties were also attributed to the educational system (e.g. time cost, assessment, preparation) or the teachers’ personal skills (e.g. preparation, classroom control). RQ3: The primary teachers mentioned three conflicting demands associated with group work. First, they identified the conflict of relinquishing vs. exercising control when it comes to classroom management and content learning. Second, they perceived conflicting demands in terms of time-efficient vs. sustainable learning by means of group work. Third, they pointed to the fact that group work is supposed to foster social competencies while at the same time requiring these competencies in the first place in order to be effective. The present study identified difficulties and conflicting demands that may explain the limited usage of small group learning in school practice. The results indicate that problems associated with group work cannot be solved by means of teacher training only but need to be addressed at different levels of the school system.

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