CEE TEL Design Group Work Online Developing Group Work
Developing group work skills online
- Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders in Marine Science
- Courses
- Future Students
- Current Students
- Research and Teaching
- Partners and Community
- About JCU
- Reputation and Experience
- Celebrating 50 Years
- Academy
- Anthropological Laboratory for Tropical Audiovisual Research (ALTAR)
- Anton Breinl Research Centre
- Agriculture Technology and Adoption Centre
- Living on Campus
- Advanced Prawn Breeding Research Hub
- Advanced Analytical Centre
- Applying to JCU
- Alumni
- AMHHEC
- JCU Aquaculture Solutions
- AusAsian Mental Health Research Group
- ARCSTA
- Area 61
- Association of Australian University Secretaries
- Australian/NZ Students
- Australian Lions Stinger Research
- Boating and Diving
- JCU-CSIRO Partnership
- Employability Edge
- Career Ready Plan
- Australian Tropical Herbarium
- Careers at JCU
- Careers and Employability
- Australian Quantum & Classical Transport Physics Group
- Centre for Tropical Bioinformatics and Molecular Biology
- CITBA
- Chancellery
- CMT
- CASE
- College of Business, Law and Governance
- College of Healthcare Sciences
- WHOCC for N&M Education and Research
- College of Medicine and Dentistry
- College of Science and Engineering
- CPHMVS
- COVID-19 Advice
- Centre for Disaster Solutions
- CSTFA
- Cyclone Testing Station
- The Centre for Disaster Studies
- Daintree Rainforest Observatory
- Diploma of Higher Education
- Discover Nature at JCU
- Research Division
- Services and Resources Division
- Education Division
- Division of Tropical Environments and Societies
- Division of Tropical Health and Medicine
- Economic Geology Research Centre
- Elite Athletes
- eResearch
- Environmental Research Complex [ERC]
- Estate
- Financial and Business Services Office
- Fletcherview
- Foundation for Australian Literary Studies
- Gender Equity Action and Research
- GetReady4Uni
- Give to JCU
- Governance
- Information for JCU Cairns Graduates
- Graduate Research School
- Graduation
- Indigenous Education and Research Centre
- Indigenous Engagement
- Indigenous Legal Needs Project
- Inherent Requirements
- IsoTropics Geochemistry Lab
- IT Services
- International Schools
- International Students
- Research and Innovation Services
- JCU Eduquarium
- JCU Events
- JCU Global Experience
- JCU Ideas Lab
- JCU Job Ready
- JCU Motorsports
- JCU Prizes
- JCU Sport
- JCU Turtle Health Research
- Language and Culture Research Centre
-
CEE
- Search
- About CEE
- Education Strategy
- [email protected] Support
- [email protected]
-
TEL Design
- About LearnJCU
-
Assessment & Feedback
- Artificial Intelligence
- Assessment Tools
- Assessing Group Work
- Assessment Case Studies
- Assessment Methods
- Enable or Disable Submission View
- Inline Marking
- Grade Centre Setup
- Group Assessment Tools
- Marking and Feedback
- Multiple Choice Questions
- One Question at a Time
- Peer Review
- Release Conditions
- Respondus Secure Online Exams
- Respondus FAQs
- Safe Assign
- Save Grade Centre Filtering
- Submission Receipts
- Test Response Download
- Test Settings
- Timezones
- Video Assessment
- Collaboration
- Communication
-
Content & Learning Resources
- Accessibility in LearnJCU
- Banners for Subjects
- Computations
- Content Management
- Create Studio
- DIY Engaging Videos
- Emojis in Ultra Docs
- Exemplars in LearnJCU
- H5P in LearnJCU
- Hypothesis
- Intro Videos
- Learning Glass
- Learning Sequence (PDF)
- LearnJCU Layouts (PDF)
- Digital Media Support
- LinkedIn Learning
- Mayer's 12 Principles of Multimedia (PDF)
- Media Resources
- Open and Licensed Resources
- Padlet in LearnJCU
- Panopto Video Capture
- PebblePad ePortfolios
- Progress Tracking
- Release Conditions
- Subject Site Setup
- Organisation & Structure
- Participation & Engagement
- Subscribe to the Learn Lowdown
- Teach with Tech Ebook
- Data & Evaluation
- Student Success
-
Development & Recognition
- Professional Development
- PD Webinar Recordings
-
Grants & Awards
- JCU Learning & Teaching Innovation Grants
- JCU Sessional Teaching Awards
- JCU Inclusive Practice Awards
- JCU Inclusive and Accessible LearnJCU Site Awards
- JCU Citations for Sustained Commitment to Enhancing Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
- JCU Citations for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning
- National Citations for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning
- Communities of Practice
- SoTL @JCU
- LearnJCU
- Library
- Mabo Decision: 30 years on
- National Reconciliation Week
- MARF
- Marine Geophysics Laboratory
- New students
- Off-Campus Students
- Office of the Vice Chancellor and President
- Virtual Open Day
- Orpheus
- Outstanding Alumni
- Parents and Partners
- Pathways to university
- Planning for your future
- Placements
- Policy
- PAHL
- Publications
- Professional Experience Placement
- Queensland Research Centre for Peripheral Vascular Disease
- Rapid Assessment Unit
- RDIM
- Researcher Development Portal
- Safety and Wellbeing
- Scholarships
- Contextual Science for Tropical Coastal Ecosystems
- Staff
- State of the Tropics
- Strategic Procurement
- Student Equity and Wellbeing
- Student profiles
- SWIRLnet
- TARL
- TESS
- TREAD
- TropEco
- TQ Maths Hub
- TUDLab
- Unicare Centre and Unicampus Kids
- UAV
- VAVS Home
- Work Health and Safety
- WHOCC for Vector-borne & NTDs
- Media
- Copyright and Terms of Use
- Australian Institute of Tropical Health & Medicine
How to develop group work skills online
To scaffold the development of group work skills, consider the skills that are required for effective collaboration on the particular assessment product. These skills may be needed in addition to those required to produce a similar assessment product individually. The skills may include:
1. Organisation and communication
Organisation and communication cover a range of professional micro-skills that subject coordinators want students to demonstrate. Tutorial activities and online resources can be used to explain and develop these skills as well as planning and development of group assessment product. (Activity 1 - Form groups of 4 (PDF, 1325 KB))
Explaining expectations of students allows them to perform as required:
Give explicit instructions for online behavioural expectations (“netiquette”):
- Example discussion board expectations (DOCX, 17 KB)
- Example email protocol (PDF, 240 KB)
- Teacher protocols: Using Collaborate
- Student netiquette: Using Collaborate (PDF, 529 KB)
- Give students tools: Group contract and group action plan (DOCX, 16 KB)
Use Stage 1 and 2 E-tivities on LearnJCU discussions to develop organisation and communication:
Description of the 5 stages of online community development with examples of e-tivities
Suggest (but do not mandate) to students that they upload profile pictures of themselves to facilitate personal connection in discussion boards
Asynchronous collaboration in LearnJCU:
- Discussion boards
- Are for whole cohort discussion on a set topic and are the best vehicle for e-tivities
- Student LearnJCU help guide: using discussion boards
- Group discussion boards
- Are visible to members of groups and the moderator
- Student Blackboard help guide: using group discussions
- Class conversations
- Are available to the entire cohort and are linked to a specific item in the subject site eg an Ultra document
- Student LearnJCU help guide: using class conversations
- Group class conversations
- Are visible to members of assessment groups and are linked to a specific assessment item eg assessment dropbox
- Student LearnJCU help guide: using group conversations
- Also dropbox, Facebook email but records of participation are harder to share with lecturers
Synchronous communication
- Collaborate rooms
- Are available to students in assessment groups. Collaborate rooms can be set up using group conversations.
- Teacher Blackboard help guide: setting up group conversations
- Google docs
- Can be used to write documents synchronously, these can be shared with staff using staff gmail addresses.
- Staff can see revision history of documents to monitor relative contribution by students.
- OneDrive
- Can allow students to have secure shared documents to avoid version control issues, however live documents cannot be shared with staff due to the different O365 tenancies.
- Documents can be downloaded and uploaded to LearnJCU
- O365: Email, One Drive and Office
Additional resources to support student group work including a group action plan and tips and tools for online meetings for students.
- Archee, R., Gurney, M., & Mohan, T. (2013). Communicating as professionals (3rd ed.). Cengage.
- Hoppe, M., and Hoppe, M. (2006) Active Listening: Improve your ability to listen and lead. Centre for creative leadership.
- How to make group work collaborative in online courses: four strategies
2. Equitable contribution
Some assessment tasks require evidence of equal or equitable contributions from students in the group, for example, oral presentations may require each student to present a section, whereas other assessment products may not articulate contributions from each student. Planning tools can assist the students to achieve equitable contributions, regardless of whether the product has identified student contributions.
Planning can reduce conflict between group members.
Explaining expectations of students allows them to perform as required:
- Group contract (DOCX, 16 KB) provides Subject Coordinator’s explicit expectations regarding contribution (Maybury’s two laws - Being ethical and responsible (PDF, 1144 KB))
- Group action plan (DOCX, 16 KB) allow students to set expectations collaboratively in assessment groups
- Assessment description can state how equity of students’ contributions will be assessed to promote students’ individual accountability
- Group contribution summary
- Records of participation
- Brainstorming with Crawford’s Slip Method can mitigate the tendency of confident contributors to dominate group interactions
- Self-awareness and identification of strengths and ways of working
- ‘How do you work?’ tool (Which one are you? Tutorial activity (PDF, 1355 KB))
Alternatively, group work can result in partial or completely individual assessment. Assessment tasks can require collaborative process and yet maintain identifiably individual contributions which are then assessed. In this example, peer-to-peer learning is used in a multi-staged assessment task with individual contributions. The stages comprise an initial position statement, response to group members’ position statement and reflection.
- Hasson, G. (2017). Emotional intelligence pocketbook: little exercises for an intuitive life. Capstone.
3. Leadership and self-management
Leadership and self-management development activities include:
- Description of examples and contrast with non-examples for interpersonal behavioural styles (Archer & Hughes 2010)
- Modelling of analysis of exemplars, scenarios of mixed communication or behavioural styles
- Reflective prompts to develop self-awareness and social intelligence (Hasson, 2017)
- Role establishment can provide structure to assist students in working effectively by utilising personal strengths: List of group roles and functions (adapted from Benne and Sheats (1948)
- Awareness and management of communication style can assist with relationship management
- See “Dialling down heightened emotions” in (Hasson, 2017)
- Negotiation and conflict resolution (excellent student conflict support modules for tertiary students).
- Bunting, M. (2016) The mindful leader: 7 practices for transforming your organisation, your leadership and your life. Wiley
- Lewis, S. (2016). Positive psychology and change: how leadership, collaboration and appreciative inquiry create transformational results. Wiley Blackwell
- Archer, A. And Hughes, (2010). Explicit Instruction: effective and efficient teaching. Guildford Press (see non-examples and active participation)
- Hasson, G. (2017). Emotional intelligence pocketbook: little exercises for an intuitive life. John Wiley and Sons, Incorporated
- Archee, R., Gurney, M., & Mohan, T. (2013). Communicating as professionals (3rd ed.). Cengage.
4. Giving and receiving feedback
Both giving and receiving feedback are nuanced and learned skills that require explicit instruction and many opportunities for development.
Subject coordinators can provide scaffolding such as:
- Feedback banks to use in peer assessments
- Clear instructions on the type and scope of feedback required for peer assessments
- Modelling provision of feedback in context
- Role playing opportunities with scenarios involving difficult conversations
- Activities to develop giving and receiving feedback can include analysis and reworking of destructive, inaccurate or inconsiderate feedback, examples can be found in TV shows, YouTube videos
- Reflection of previous difficult conversations, see Hasson (2017) for reflection prompts.
- Giving and receiving feedback Boud (1994) provides concise and considered advice that can be adapted to many contexts
- Hasson, G. (2017). Managing criticism in Emotional Intelligence pocketbook: little exercises for an intuitive life. John Wiley and Sons, Incorporated.
Overall
- Brown, R. E. (2001).The process of community-building in distance learning classes. Internet High Educ.;5(2),18–35.
- Lilley, K. (2014). Educating global citizens: Translating the idea into university organisational practice.
- Chen, J. (2012). 50 Digital team-building games.John Wiley & Sons
- Scannell, E. and Newstrom, J. (1997). The Big Book of Virtual Teambuilding Games. McGraw-Hill Education
- Garrison, D.R. and Arbaugh, J.B. (2007). Researching the community of inquiry framework: Review, issues, and future directions. Internet High Educ. (10),157–72.
- Rickards, T. and Moger, S. (2000). Creative Leadership Processes in Project Team Development: An Alternative to Tuckman’s Stage Model. Br J Manag. (11),273–83.
- Tuckman B. (1965) Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychol Bull 63(6):384–99.
- Shuman, L., Besterfield-Sacre, M. and McGourtey, J. (2005) The ABET "Professional skills" - Can they taught? Can they be assessed?