Abstracts - Earli

O 201 September 2007 08:30 - 10:30Room: -1.62SIG Invited SymposiumThe transmission of social competence in the school and in the peergroup; a focus on cultural diverChair: Paul Vedder, Leiden University, NetherlandsOrganiser: Paul Vedder, Leiden University, NetherlandsDiscussant: Åsa Mäkitalo, Department of Education, Göteborg University, SwedenThroughout Europe educational institutions are increasingly confronted with the question whatthey can do to support students’ development of social competencies. A fear for a reduction ofsocial cohesion in our societies, heightened levels of interethnic tensions, as well as a seeminglylow involvement of youth in political activities and community development projects are abackground for the pressing nature of this question. How do researchers respond to this question?Do they have a clear notion of instruments measuring social competence and their validity in termsof the feasibility to assess relevant criterion behavior? What is relevant criterion behavior? And arewe capable of developing valuable intervention studies to influence social competence or, stateddifferently, are we capable of identifying valid "conditions – mechanisms – outcome chains?" Thissymposium is meant to present empirical research that is seeking answers to these questions.Given the multicultural nature of our modern societies the presentations will all explicitly describeand justify the way the studies dealt with cultural diversity issues and how these affected theoutcomes.The impact of a cooperative learning curriculum on pupils’ social status development andinterethnic bias at multiethnic elementary schoolsMichiel Oortwijn, Leiden University, NetherlandsPaul Vedder, Leiden University, NetherlandsHow do pupils in multicultural elementary schools perceive pupils with different ethnicbackgrounds? And how is their perception influenced by ethnically heterogeneous grouping? Inthis study we investigated popularity and perceived cooperativeness in multiethnic pupil teams inelementary schools. First of all, we hypothesized that pupils’ popularity and perceivedcooperativeness would increase as a function of SCL time. Secondly, we hypothesized that SCLtime increases the popularity and level off the difference in perceived cooperativeness betweennational and immigrant pupils. Finally, many studies have found that interethnic contact reducesinterethnic bias because it facilitates the formation of interethnic friendships. We propose in thispaper that SCL time not only increases interethnic friendships, but also augments the popularityand perceived cooperativeness within ethnically heterogeneous teams, but not of ethnicallyhomogeneous teams. 94 Pupils (26 teams) from five multiethnic elementary schools participated ina structured cooperative learning (SCL) curriculum. Both teachers and pupils had no prior SCLexperience. The curriculum entailed two SCL training lessons, followed by a SCL mathcurriculum of nine lessons. The results show that SCL time increased both popularity andcooperativeness across ethnic background. In addition, experience with SCL increased thepopularity of immigrant pupils and decreased the perceived cooperativeness difference betweenimmigrant pupils and national pupils. Lastly, SCL time only augmented the popularity and– 772 –