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Collaboration is the ability to work effectively and respectfully with diverse teams. It involves the ability to exercise flexibility and making compromises to accomplish a common goal along with a shared responsibility for collaborative work. It also includes children's ability to express their own, and listen to others' thoughts and ideas or needs. Collaboration can be influenced by various factors, including characteristics of the child, the immediate and surrounding context, and the larger cultural setting. How children engage in Collaboration is often guided by their understanding of social norms across contexts, and cultural socialization practices and expectations. Therefore children across different backgrounds may engage in peer Collaboration differently, as might children who have difficulty gauging social cues due to language-based learning disabilities or ADHD. While inattentiveness and impulsivity are often barriers to engagement for children with ADHD, research has also found that even young children with ADHD who don't display perceived “behavior problems” are still often less engaged. When children are able to learn with and from each other this can strengthen their Social Awareness and Relationship Skills. Collaboration helps students to think more deeply and creatively, make friends, learn at school and beyond, and form beliefs about the world and others.
Collaboration is a multifaceted skill that involves Communicating with others, resolving conflicts, and managing tasks. When students are truly collaborating, they are not only working alongside one another (i.e., cooperating) but they are working together towards the same shared goal. With Collaboration, each individual is held accountable for work of the team, ensuring individual contributions are valued. Educators can create inclusive classroom environments that foster Collaboration by encouraging children across all different skill levels and backgrounds to use their strengths and to learn and participate in the same activities, tasks, and routines by providing the required scaffolding. High levels of meaningful inclusion supports students with diverse interests and abilities by allowing them to bring their own strengths, skills, and practices, from home to the classroom.
Socialization practices and cultural paradigms for learning together or dividing roles can contribute to differences in Collaboration, which can in turn contribute to children's Motivation to engage in peer collaboration. While social interactions are typically scaffolded in urban Western populations, in other communities in the U.S., such as Indigenous communities or farming communities, children may learn to collaborate through observation and active, playful participation in daily chores and practices without much adult supervision.
Further, children who are supported in Collaboration, and those who experience positive Emotion through Collaboration, may be more likely to collaborate, and this success with simple Collaboration motivates children to engage in complex collaboration Therefore, it is important that educators consider cultural differences and culturally-specific social behaviors in their teaching practice, aim to support children in experiencing positive emotions during Collaboration activities, and use a variety of collaborative learning approaches in the classroom. In early childhood, Collaboration is best experienced and supported through various forms of play, which offers a safe context for children to explore new skills, negotiate social roles, to recognize and respond to their own and others' feelings, share, follow rules, and resolve conflicts.
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