*2.2. Participants*

The study comprised two sets of students. The first set was made up of sixty-three fourth-year pre-service primary school teachers taking a bachelor's degree in Primary School Education (specializing in physical education) at the University of Girona. For the purposes of this study, the participants were divided into twenty-four PreServ groups: from PreServ1 to PreServ24. Thus, each PreServ group comprised two to three pre-service teachers. The pre-service teachers were randomly assigned to each group.

The second set of students comprised two hundred and eighty-eight students from six primary schools selected from the list of schools held by the Faculty of Education at the University of Girona. For the study, the forty-eight primary-school students in each school were divided into eight groups, each group comprising six randomly distributed students. In each school, the resulting groups were then labeled PrimSc1 through to PrimSc8. When the instructional cooperative tasks were implemented in the schools, each pre-service teacher group, composed of two to three individuals, was randomly assigned to two PrimSc groups, composed of six individuals each. Consequently, each PreServ group

carried out the activities associated with a specific approach with two PrimSc, at the same time, i.e., with twelve students.

#### *2.3. Definition of Instructional Approaches: Structured Versus Non-Structured Cooperative Activities*

The pre-service teachers had been informed that they would be participating in a study incorporating both collaborative and reflective methods. They attended eight seminars, six on collaborative learning and two on reflective learning, where they learned about the methodologies. Seminars were given by the members of the research group, and each seminar lasted two hours.

Each pre-service group came up with a cooperative activity to be implemented in a school. From a total of twelve activities proposed during one of the seminars, these were whittled down to eight once the class had evaluated the activities as a group. At the schools, each pre-service teacher group implemented, firstly, a collaborative activity designed by the group members themselves and, secondly, the eight collaborative activities chosen by the whole group. Therefore, each pre-service teacher group implemented a total of nine cooperative physical challenges for each group and school where they had their teaching practice.

In a second stage, and together with the research team of this study, the nine cooperative challenges were divided into three sets (Table 1). As such, the first three challenges were designed to be implemented in the schools using a structured instructional approach, challenges four to six were designed to be implemented using a semi-structured instructional approach and the last three a non-structured instructional approach. Thus, the study consisted of each pre-service teacher group organizing the nine cooperative activities (CA1 to CA9) for their corresponding groups from the primary schools. CA1 to CA3 were organized using a defined structure, including fixed materials and student roles (Table 1), whereas CA4–CA6 used a defined semi-structure, which included free-to-choose materials from the supplies provided but fixed student roles (Table 1). Finally, CA7–CA9 were non-structured activities where neither material nor student roles were defined (Table 1).

> **Table 1.** Defining elements for each type of instructional approach.


Cooperative challenges are a structured technique that form part of cooperative learning in education and are carried out in small groups that demand the participation of all the components—a fundamental characteristic of cooperative learning. The teacher proposes the cooperative challenge, and it is the students who, in a consensual way, must share ideas, plan, question themselves, and propose the action required to solve the cooperative challenge.

In the first group of activities (composing the structured instructional approach to cooperative learning), the cooperative challenges were presented by the pre-service teachers to the primary-school students in a structured manner. That is, the material with which to carry out the cooperative challenge had already been arranged by the pre-service teachers in the space where the cooperative challenge was to take place. All the groups were asked to complete the same cooperative challenge at the same time, and the pre-service teachers set the limitations for the time taken and space used. Finally, the pre-service teachers defined the primary-school students' roles. In the semi-structured activities (CA4–CA6), the cooperative challenges were again to be presented to the primary-school students by the pre-service teachers, and they also defined the roles of the members in the groups. In this case, however, the materials and the temporal distribution order of each cooperative challenge, the space where it would be carried out, and the duration of each cooperative challenge were all defined by the primary-school students themselves. Finally, in the non-structured activities (CA7–CA9) the temporal distribution order of each cooperative challenge, the space where it would be carried out, and the

duration of each cooperative challenge, as well as the roles within the groups, were managed by the primary-school students themselves (i.e., not by the pre-service teachers).

#### *2.4. Development of Cooperative Challenges*

The cooperative challenges were held (one approach per week) once a week for three consecutive weeks. All the school groups were given 20 min to complete the cooperative challenge. The four pre-service groups assigned to the schools carried out the challenges proposed with two PrimSc groups at the same time. It was estimated that after discounting the travel times between the classroom and the playground, the cooperative challenge sessions (presentation of the challenge and definition of material and roles), the group reflections, and the clean-up time, the sessions lasted ninety minutes.

In each session, each PrimSc group encountered three cooperative challenges. A plastic sheet placed next to each challenge explained what had to be solved, what rules had to be followed, that the possible solution had to be agreed upon, and was then executed according to the rules. If the challenge was not initially overcome, the students could try again as many times as they wanted to solve it. If they were successful, the students would go on to the second challenge. The groups also had the option of surrendering if they understood that, for whatever reason, they could not overcome the challenge they were dealing with. During the challenge, the pre-service teachers observed the development, took notes, encouraged and ensured equal participation in the groups, introduced security rules before certain solutions were attempted, resolved any doubts at the time of understanding the approach to each challenge, and regulated any conflict or negative situations in the groups. (NB: the pre-service teachers never intervened to o ffer solutions or impose their criteria in the case of a conflict). At the end of each session, the students came together to reflect as a group. In the group reflection with four to six students, each PreServ teacher facilitated the session by introducing process questions and then took notes on the comments made by the primary-school students.

#### *2.5. Reflective Narratives on Cooperative Activities and Identity Construction, Analysis, and Coding*

Once the pre-service teachers had finished CA1–CA3, CA4–CA6, and CA7–CA9, they were asked to produce individual reflective narratives. This resulted in a final total of one-hundred and eighty-nine narratives.

The content of these narratives was analyzed using the Rubric for Narrative Reflection Assessment [30] (Table 2). This rubric is based on four elements of analysis, distributed into ten indicators. The degree of reflection for each indicator varied on a scale from 1 to 5, where 1 indicates absence or a low weighting, and 5 indicates the highest level of performance. The four elements corresponded to: (1) identifying the situation, activity, or experience that triggered reflection, (2) identifying prior conceptions and beliefs and, therefore, awareness of one's own previous beliefs, knowledge, and experiences, (3) focusing on and probing the focus of reflection, context, and professional context and (4) understanding the process of transformation; firstly through setting, arguing, and transferring students' concrete learning objectives, and then by implementing new action plans (Table 2).

The content of the narratives was also analyzed using a constructed Rubric for Identity Construction [29]. This rubric is based on four elements of analysis matching the categories of professional identity (Table 3). The degree of reflection for each indicator varied from levels 1 to 5, with 1 being the lowest score corresponding to not related: the student did not mention the component, or the content of reflection was not related to this component. Level 2 corresponded to descriptive writing: the student formulated the professional identity component and established it as their focus of reflection. Level 3 corresponded to a descriptive reflection/thoughtful action: the student reframed the professional identity component into their previous knowledge. Level 4 corresponded to reflection: the student evaluated di fferent alternatives and integrated them into new settings and reviewed perspectives about their professionalism. Finally, level 5 corresponded to critical reflection: the students transformed the new social, cultural, and political reflections into ongoing professionalism.

The scoring of the one-hundred and eighty-nine narratives based on the two rubrics of students' assessment was completed independently by the members of the research team. Previously, and to obtain sufficient inter-rate reliability, sixteen narratives per approach (25% of the total) were evaluated together by the members of the research team. The assessment was openly compared and discussed. When the assessment created controversy between two members of the research group, the rating was adapted to the full agreemen<sup>t</sup> of the four members.

> **Table 2.** Elements of the rubric for students' reflective narrative assessment.

#### **Dimension 1: The focus of reflection**

Situation, activity, or experience that triggers the reflective process.


#### **Dimension 2: Prior conceptions and beliefs**

Prior conceptions and beliefs: awareness of one's own previous beliefs, knowledge, and experiences.

