Student-student cooperation promotes diversity, inclusion, and the SDGs in language education

George M. Jacobs & Marla Lise
Kampung Senang Charity and Education Foundation | The Eco Chapter

Language learners are diverse in many ways. These differences include country of origin, ethnicity, gender, religion, social class, past achievement, sexual identity, neurotype, mother tongue, age, physical and mental disabilities, and previous education. Everyone deserves respect and the right to a learning environment in which their needs, both physiological and psychological, are met. This article explores how inclusion, diversity, and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) can meet these needs. Inclusion brings together diverse language users to benefit from what each can contribute based on their uniqueness, to empower others to do the same, and to use their language proficiency and other skills to make the world a better place. Various approaches in language education seek to support “unity in diversity” among students by facilitating student-student cooperation. Cooperative learning is one such approach. Since the 1970s, cooperative learning has established itself as a well-researched approach with a strong and wide theoretical grounding. Furthermore, scholars have linked cooperative learning to many other elements of the student-centered paradigm, including work that urges education to play a role in making society a better place rather than focusing solely on enhancing individuals’ own careers and lifestyles. The SDGs present a well-known example of how education can serve the greater good and build a world in which everyone, regardless of background, can be included in a grand effort to make the planet a place where everyone feels at home and can contribute to making that home a place where everyone can thrive.

Publication history
Table of contents

Physically, compared to other animals, humans are not very impressive, being far from the largest, strongest, fastest, or equipped with the keenest senses or the sharpest teeth or claws. Thus, ancient homo sapiens needed to cooperate, to combine their meager powers, to survive. This cooperation continues, even though human technology has empowered the species to dominate the planet. In the present, human-human cooperation has greatly increased and expanded. Food offers just one example. Few people grow, find, or hunt their own food. Instead, the food most people eat comes to them, thanks to the joint efforts of many, many others, each performing diverse yet crucial roles. Thus, on the one hand, humans have become much more powerful, but on the other hand, much more interdependent. As can be seen in pandemics, what harms one person can soon harm others, even if those others reside on the other side of the planet.

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