Collaborative and cooperative learning

To proofread a colleague’s list of activities that teachers can run within large lecture groups, I need to know the difference between collaborative learning and cooperative learning.

The term ‘cooperative learning’ might be owned by Spencer Kagan (who wrote a book about it in 1994, and has a rather fabulous Barbie-coloured website now, with lots of juicy resources – I’d like to see the IWB software to support Kagan Structures). A brief overview of the concept points out the mutual benefit theme and lists some of the activities that re-structure the class from a large, passive lump to small, active structures – pairs, fours, etc.

A collaborative learning space, the 'Learning Lab' at Melbourne Uni's School of Chemistry

Melb. uni has a flyer on collaborative learning but I get the feeling that the term has a special connotation for virtual world educators (my colleague is certainly committed to this intriguing area). I’m not sure that technically the term means anything more than group work, but I will keep alert for more.