He's referring to the phenomenon of certain groups of students cheating on homework and justifying it by claiming it's a cultural difference in approach to learning. It's not. It's outright splitting up work between peers, often with the use of illicit solutions manuals, for the purpose of gaming the grading system. It's especially beneficial in classes where the professor just writes exams from homework problems or problems very similar to them.
There isn't anything special or insightful, mystical or different or "eastern" about cooperative learning. I'm thoroughly "western" and had plenty of homework groups in both undergrad and grad school. Nor is there anything special about the cooperative cheating I described: "certain groups" applied to plenty of western peer groups I saw in undergrad especially, though they didn't claim what they were doing was some "cultural" thing, as they knew it was simply cheating.
There isn't anything special or insightful, mystical or different or "eastern" about cooperative learning. I'm thoroughly "western" and had plenty of homework groups in both undergrad and grad school. Nor is there anything special about the cooperative cheating I described: "certain groups" applied to plenty of western peer groups I saw in undergrad especially, though they didn't claim what they were doing was some "cultural" thing, as they knew it was simply cheating.