Interdisciplinary project-based learning: the impact of co-teaching on students’ achievement

The study discusses the results of a multiple-case research on a co-taught project-based interdisciplinary workshop that was run for four academic years with the cohorts of students enrolled in the final year of the three-year degree course in education science (first-cycle degree) at the University of Macerata (Italy). Co-teaching was organised as a cluster developed across and within two different main courses in the socio-pedagogical curriculum, Intercultural Pedagogy and Instructional Technology, with the aim of activating a challenging learning process in which students working in small groups would be engaged in authentic projects and in the development of a final output which should reify the interdisciplinary objective of the workshop. The discussion on the impact of co-teaching applied to the workshop addressed the students’ learning process in terms of relationships between professors’ scaffolding and strategies and (1) behavioural outcomes (such as teamwork skills and engagement), and (2) cognitive outcomes (interdisciplinary comprehension and approach). The longitudinal analysis highlighted perceived advantages connected to plural methodologies to promote and develop creative processes, communication and collaboration strategies, and an integrated approach to disciplinary core concepts.