8 prefer to do, teachers can be one step ahead in preparing various additional activities for
facilitating a good learning. Further support of the importance of perception studies can be found in a research
which has been conducted by Savignon and Wang 2003 in Taiwan. This study revealed that while the teachers estimated their students to like grammar-based classes in learning
English, the fact showed inversely that the students preferred having communication- based activities to grammar-based ones. This study adds weight to the view that the
disparity between teachers and students can really happen in the actual teaching and learning process if the teachers only accept their own viewpoints as the only contributing
factor of determining the tasks. Hence, it is worth pointing out that taking the students‟ perceptions into account when it comes to designing tasks is a very important thing to do.
3. Perceived Advantages of Group Work
Group work has long been confirmed to offer various social as well as educational benefits for the students Colbeck et al., 2000; Gillies, 2011; Slavin, 1987. Socially, the
use of group work in the classroom has been viewed as a learning strategy which capably improves the communication skills among members Johnson Johnson, 1994; Mello,
1993, the value of respecting others Slavin, 1995, as well as the solidity in friendships Walker, 2001.
Meanwhile educationally, group work has also been proven to enhance critical thinking skills, self-motivation, and learning durability of the students which result in the
9 higher achievements on the grades if it is compared to individual learning Boud et al.,
1999; Slavin, 1995. Moreover, this better achievement can also be sensed in the language learning context since group work may not only improve the quantity of
students‟ interaction in using the target language, but also its quality Long Porter, 1985.
Additionally, the benefits of group work are not viewed as being only restricted to the classroom achievement. Given the fact of the rapid global demand of qualified
workers, group work is also recognized as an effective way to build many work skills such as team-work, leadership, social networking, problem solving, and among others,
which will be highly required in today‟s workplaces Davis Miller, 1996; Harvey et al., 1997. What is more, the fact indicates that the past two decades have become the
evidence of the rise of this group work trend Hansen, 2006. Even, some scholars also reveal that more than four-fifths of institutions have been proven to really make use of
group work in the real practice Cohen and Bailey, 1997. This finding reinforces further that the benefits of group work might be increasingly considered by lots of organizations
all over the world in these days.
4. Views Against Group work
Besides the benefits that group work offers, a lot of studies also find that the use of group work can bring several new problems in the classroom. Most of the problems
are commonly related to interpersonal conflict with other group members Mello, 1993;
10 the presence of members who
do not really take part in the task, who are called as „free riders‟ Boud, 2001, „passengers‟ Bourner et al., 2001, „freeloaders‟ Daly Worrel,
1993, or „hitchhikers‟ Oakley et al., 2004, but still gain the benefits of the mark Mello,
1993; different schedules among members Oakley et al., 2004; diverse orientation of the final grades Oakley et al., 2004, lack of leadership skills Bolton, 1999; and also
lack of guidance from the tutors which causes ineffective working performance from the group Bolton, 1999.
In a set of similar studies in Asia for instance, while studies conducted by Iqbal 2004 and Keramati 2010 in Iran as well as Zakaria et al. 2013 in Indonesia could
prove that group work was effective in promoting higher grades for the senior high school students, a study led by Thanh et al. 2008 showed differently. In the study,
Thanh et al. tried to challenge the Western common assumption of the effectiveness of group work by revealing some studies with various school levels in Asian context which
did not work. The findings showed that from 14 studies that had been selected and reviewed carefully, 7 studies
– 50 of them indicated that group work was not significant to enhance grades, or even ineffective to promote a better learning for the
primary, secondary, and tertiary students. Even, Thanh et al. argued that the finding was enough to infer that group work principles “do [did] not suit the local [Asian] context in
terms of both cultural values and infrastructure conditions, leading to rejections from different levels” p. 82. This finding points out that the benefits of group work, which
