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Student Collaborationin the Online Classroom

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3Student Collaboration in the Online Classroom • www.FacultyFocus.com

Student Collaborationin the Online Classroom


Table of Contents

Introduction: Student Collaboration in the Online Classroom ......................................................................................5

Online Teamwork Quick Reference (Summary) ..........................................................................................................6

Keeping Teamwork Alive, Motivated, and Enthused! ..................................................................................................8

Improving Results and Reducing Frustrations from Team Activities ............................................................................9

How to Promote Collaborative Active Online Learning ..............................................................................................11

Considering Collaboration ........................................................................................................................................12

7 Ways to Improve Student Satisfaction in Online Courses ........................................................................................15

Open-Source Blog Platform Provides Much-Needed Communication Flexibility ........................................................16

Building Community in Online Classes through Group Work ....................................................................................17

Study: Changing Virtual Team Membership Improves Participation ..........................................................................19

Facilitating Student Interaction with Online Discussion Groups ................................................................................20

Active Online Learning Prepares Students for the Workplace, Reflects Changing Learning Style Preferences ............22

17 Tips for Successfully Including Peer Collaboration in an Online Course................................................................23

Comparing Online Peer Interaction Methods ............................................................................................................25

Developing Community Online..................................................................................................................................26

Let Students Choose How to Collaborate....................................................................................................................27

Online Process-Oriented Group Projects ....................................................................................................................28

How a Former Student/Current Instructor Facilitates Online Student Collaboration ..................................................29


Student Collaboration in the Online Classroom

Using team assignments in an online course can be an excellent way to create commu-nity and improve learning. But just as in a face-to-face course, student collaboration

in the online classroom requires careful course design, student preparation, and teammanagement.

This Online Classroom special report is a compilation of articles that will help you• recognize when teamwork is an appropriate strategy• overcome student resistance to working together on group projects• select collaboration tools• teach students how to collaborate online• monitor teams and help resolve conflict, and provide meaningful feedback.

We have compiled this special report to provide you with online collaboration design andfacilitation ideas that work, whether you are a new or seasoned online instructor.

— Rob KellyEditorOnline Classroom

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Student Collaboration in the Online Classroom • www.FacultyFocus.com

What Is Teamwork?Teamwork occurs when individ-

ual peers redefine themselves as agroup. (Smith, p.26)

Collaborative learning, collectivedecision making, teambuilding, andgroup projects are all teamwork ac-tivities that involve taking responsi-bility for one’s ideas and havingsensitivity to the ideas and goals ofothers. (Shank, p. 12)

Teamwork mirrors the real worldwhere sharing information andunder-standing the views of othersis often critical. (Shank, p. 12)

What are the Benefits ofTeamwork? (Engle, p.11)• Learners think through topics

more thoroughly• Teamwork encourages exploration

of alternative perspectives and so-lutions

• Teamwork stimulates criticalthinking and helps learners clarifyideas through discussion and de-bate

• Solutions are typically better thanwhat one learner could developworking individually — particu-larly if the project is complex.

What Other Skills Does TeamworkDevelop? (Engle, p.11)• High-Level Thinking skills• Negotiating skills• Feedback skills• Communication skills• Project Management skills• Interpersonal skills• Intercultural skills

Kelly, Justin, Neil, and Cori have been assigned ateamwork project. Kelly tends to take charge andmakes sure everything gets done according to her

high standards. Justin is happy because he was on ateam with Kelly previously and received a high gradewithout putting in much effort. Neil has been finishinghis degree one course at a time because of his hecticwork schedule, and Cori is new. Because of familyobligations, Cori is only able to work on school projectsin the evenings.

See any likely problems for this team? As you know, teamwork projects canbe frustrating. The most common reasons for learner frustrations include in-adequate preparation and communication, and the most common reason forfaculty frustration is the need to deal with learner frustrations. (Shank, p. 9)

How Do Instructors Successfully IncorporateTeamwork in Online Teaching and Learning?• Define Teamwork & Prepare Learners for Team Roles Early

Begin by making teamwork a stated course outcome. Collaboration, partici-pation, and communication expectations should be written into the syllabus.(Roby, 2005) Then, discuss teamwork, broadly, during the first class. Usereal-life examples of the benefits of teamwork with which learners can iden-tify as a great teamwork motivator. (Sull, p. 8)

Terry Morris, associate professor at William Rainey Harper College in Pala-tine, Illinois, uses her online “Working in Teams” module (http://terrymor-ris.net/teamwork) to help learners understand team roles, how to be goodteam members, and how to resolve conflicts. After learners have used themodule, she facilitates a discussion about teamwork experiences, includingwhat made them good or not so good and how to prevent the not-so-goodones. (Shank, p. 9)

• Establish Criteria for Forming The TeamsSome instructors set up teams and others allow learners to form their own

teams. If learners are allowed to select their own teams, it’s important to pro-vide a way for them to learn enough about each other to make good deci-sions about who to work with. (Shank, p. 9)

Instructors who assign learners to teams have many options. Learners maybe randomly assigned or assigned based on their interests, skill levels, partici-

O N L I N E T E A M W O R KQuick Reference

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Best Practices compiled from Online Cl@ssroom

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Sample Teamwork CourseOutcome StatementIn this course you are required to

collaborate on a team project:• You will use the same team for

the entire course.• Your team will share a Discussion

Forum.• Teamwork grades consist of two

elements: (Engle, p. 11)1.a group grade for the product it-

self and2.an individual grade based on

peer reviews of your contribu-tion to the team.

• Failure to participate in team proj-ects is an automatic one-grade de-duction for the course. (Engle, p.11)

Sample Team Agreement• Project Title & Due Date• Project Objectives/Purpose• Team Members & Contact Info• Member Expertise• How to Communicate/How Often• Project Tasks & Deadlines• Member Roles/Deliverables• Conflict Management Procedure

Sample Peer Evaluation (Shank,p. 9)

Does this team member• accept responsibility for tasks de-

termined by the team?• respect differences of opinion and

backgrounds?• provide positive feedback of team

member accomplishments?• keep in contact with team mem-

bers for the purpose of maintain-ing team cohesion andcollaboration?

• meet team deadlines?

Working in Teams Tutorial(Shank, p. 9)

http://terrymorris.net/teamwork

pation levels, or their learning styles. (Humbert, p. 17)Forming teams based on learning styles is a great way of giving learners

the opportunity to develop projects that best fit their specific styles. For in-stance, an instructor could have a team of kinesthetic learners develop aWeb page, a team of auditory learners develop and record a jingle, and agroup of visual learners write a paper or create a flyer. (Humbert, p. 17)

Once grouping criteria have been established, create teams of three to fivelearners. (Roby, p. 23) Introduce the project and then, if possible, give theteam a relatively easy task before they take on more complex team tasks.“Before you actually launch a project, it’s important to make sure that every-body knows who’s doing what,” says Jan Engle, coordinator of instructiondevelopment at Governors State University. (Engle, p. 11)

• Guide Learners Through Team CommunicationRegardless of course platform (on-campus, hybrid, or fully online) allow

team members to choose whether they work face to face, by telephone, oronline. (Dineen, p. 19) Online interaction options can include e-mail,threaded discussion, text-based chat, document sharing, and blogs. Instruc-tors decide whether to limit online options depending on whether they planto monitor team interactions and whether team communication will be pri-vate within the group or open to the rest of the class.

Once teams are formed and the learners have some understanding of whatis expected, it’s important that they document their understanding. To facili-tate this, teams should construct their first collaborative assignment, a for-mal team agreement. (Shank, p. 9) “We identified the roles andresponsibilities, the tasks, and how they would be shared. And we did it allthrough discussion threads. Being able to have that record of the processwas very helpful,” says Valerie Taylor, a former online learner. (Taylor, p. 29)

• Improve Participation Through Peer Evaluation & Varied MembershipSome learners resist teamwork because of past experiences where they

ended up doing most of the work while others did nothing and everyone gotthe same grade. (Engle, p. 11) To prevent inequity, set up a formal mecha-nism so team members can provide feedback about and to each other. Thisallows team members time to adjust their behaviors while they can stillmake a positive difference. The results of these assessments can also beused to determine individual grades for team assignments. (Shank, p. 9)

Another idea is to replicate professional contexts where membership inworking groups changes frequently as tasks evolve. Alternating team roles(Piezon & Ferree, p. 21) and/or team membership may reduce social loafingwithout reducing levels of team communication or learning outcomes. (Di-neen, p. 19)

• Seek FeedbackIn addition to a general course evaluation, ask students for feedback on

teamwork projects/exercises, particularly those that are newly implemented.Use the comments received to adjust, abandon, or confirm the use of spe-cific teamwork projects. (Roby, p. 23)

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8

Teamwork: it is a specified or non-specified section of so many online

courses where students have the oppor-tunity to “speak” with one another in anasynchronous environment. Yet onlineinstructors often overlook its impor-tance, and it can be the most difficultsection to “maintain.” To peek in andsee a teamwork thread of five, six, or sostudents sharing ideas, growing theirlearning from this participation, and of-fering good ideas and responses—this isthe stuff that online instructors dream ofseeing in teamwork postings. Yet moti-vating students to buy into the team-work concept—beyond getting agrade—can be a challenge. It is far eas-ier for the online student to work byhim/herself than in a teamwork envi-ronment—and to do this for an entirecourse, well, instructors are wont to say... good luck!

Some basic approaches, a bit of time,and a persistent enthusiasm on the in-structor’s part can translate into team-work sessions by students that areoutstanding in that they result in thecore outcome set for teamwork, can befun and engaging, and make for a moreenjoyable and meaningful class forboth students and instructor.

To accomplish this, try the followingtechniques:

Emphasize and explain team-work—early. Many students havenever taken an online course or havenot had one that used teamwork, thusmany aspects of it will be foreign. It’svery important that you discuss team-work, broadly, in your first posting ofthe class, but also follow this with an-other posting that only emphasizes andexplains teamwork—this one-subjectposting lets students know how impor-

tant it is and they will not lose itamongst other aspects of the class. Besure to use the active voice and active,involved verbs—this “feel” only addsto the overall importance you place onteamwork and its value.

Give an example of a good team-work session. Students need to knowthat their teamwork responses cannotbe merely “I agree,” “That’s cool,”“Nice job,” and the like—yes, short re-sponses can certainly be part of team-work, but the ideal teamwork threadwill have all team members involved,each offering substantive posts (bothproactive and reactive) and about 30percent short reactive postings. Copy-ing and posting a previous team’sthread that offers what you seek inyour class will give them a nice guide—so much more effective than simplyyour description!

Become an active part of teamwork.You cannot be merely the “teacher ob-server,” but rather you need to dive inas well: respond to some of the posts,offer suggestions, give kudos when ap-propriate. (Never chastise one student“in front” of the other team member;rather, do this in a private email.) Bydoing this, the students can see thatyou walk the walk, not just talk thetalk—and a combination of your pres-ence and what you offer will truly helpmotivate them to stay active in team-work!

Post a list of teamwork problems—with possible solutions. There will bea variety of teamwork problems thatpop up: team members not contribut-ing, being too bossy, using negativelanguage, personally attacking otherteam members; technical difficultieswith postings, late postings, misunder-

standing posting requirements or proce-dures; students who complain abouttheir teamwork grade, about other teammembers, or your comments regardingtheir team postings—the list goes on.By posting a list of these, and your sug-gestions for each, at the beginning ofthe course you will cut down—tremen-dously—on student “teamwork emails”to you!

Use teamwork “genius” from stu-dents to motivate the class. Scour theteam postings regularly and gatherthose that extend beyond that one teambut can benefit the entire class—inteamwork or any other area of thecourse. This can result in two positiveoutcomes: first, students will love tohave their “genius” team postings usedfor the entire class as great examples;second, you will be demonstrating theimportance of teamwork—and both aregreat motivators.

Maintain a list of teamwork“nuggets.” These will be items youharvest from teamwork throughout thecourse that are so good that they canbe used from course to course todemonstrate great ideas that came fromteamwork; to motivate students inteamwork or another portion of thecourse; and to offer suggestions, in-sights, and info for this, that, or an-other course portion. I have so manythat they are broken into categories—including “Great Metaphors and Analo-gies”—and they prove very helpful asmotivational or information “dust”sprinkled throughout a course.

Be sure to offer substantive re-sources for teams. Beyond your opin-ions and observations on postingsduring teamwork, be sure to post web-sites, anecdotal information, and thelike that is specific to the teamworkthread—not only does this show youare actively interested in teamwork butthat you have gone “the extra mile”with solid items that can make a team’sefforts—whether it a team project or ateam discussion—better.

Answer all teamwork questions


Keeping Teamwork Alive,Motivated, and Enthused!

By Errol Craig Sull

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within 24 hours. In most onlinecourses, student questions to the in-structor are usually not posted in ateamwork thread—but this will notprevent students from doing so. Often,these are spur-of-the-moment, emo-tion-filled questions—the kind that ne-cessitate the quickest of responses. Beon the lookout for them—and let yourstudents know that all questions, com-ments, etc. posted or sent to you willreceive a response within 24 hours.(Don’t single out teamwork: if you do,you are inviting students to post ques-tions to you there!)

Use Reality-Based Education in ex-plaining the benefits of teamwork be-yond a grade. Always look foropportunities beyond the course toshow the benefit of teamwork—thesecan include working together, newideas coming out of group inter-changes, interacting with varied per-sonalities, overcoming hurdles, andmaking team decisions. Be sure tobring real-life examples of these withwhich the students can identify (Real-ity-Based Education)—this is a greatteamwork motivator, as it points outTeamwork value in everyday life.

Stay 100 percent enthusiastic aboutteamwork’s importance. You neverwant to give the appearance you are a“rah! rah!” supporter of teamwork be-cause it is your job or only for the firstpart of a course; students quickly pickup on this. Teamwork—properly exe-cuted teamwork—is a crucial compo-nent of any class, and you mustremain its most ardent cheerleader notonly in words bit in deeds ... from dayone to day last of the class.

Shauna, Juan, Morris, and Kati makeup team #3 in Dr. Davidson’s online

business ethics course. Shauna is aplanner and makes detailed plans forhome, work, and school so she canmake sure that everything she wants toaccomplish gets done according to hervery high standards. Juan is thrilled tobe on Shauna’s team because heworked with her in a previous courseand knows that Shauna’s plans usuallyresult in optimal outcomes (and highgrades). Morris has been finishing hisdegree online because he is unable tofit classroom-based courses into hishectic travel schedule, and Kati is anew online learner. Because of her fam-ily obligations, she is only able to workon school projects in the evenings.

See any likely problems for this teamfrom the get-go? If you have been imple-menting collaborative projects, youknow that they can be frustrating. Col-laborating at a distance adds additionalpotential frustrations. The most commonreasons for learner frustrations includeinadequate preparation and communica-tion, and the most common reasons forfaculty frustration include the need todeal with learner frustrations.

Setting up teamsIn online courses, learners often

don’t know much, if anything, aboutone another, so it’s hard to form teamsbased on commonalities. Online in-structors should consider implement-ing a process whereby learners are ableto find commonalities or differencesuseful for team formation and activi-ties. Depending on the purpose of the

collaboration, learners can share infor-mation about themselves such ascourse-related special interests, specificskills (when heterogeneous skills areneeded), desired topic (when teamscan choose a topic), collaboration style(such as well-planned and more lais-sez-faire), and availability (week-day/weekend, time of day, time zone).

Some instructors set up teams andothers allow learners to form their ownteams. If you prefer to allow learnersto select their own groups, it’s impor-tant to provide a way for them to learnenough about each other to make gooddecisions about who to work with.

Understanding teamworkBecause so many educational activi-

ties reward individual results, lots offolks are unprepared for teamwork. Be-fore beginning collaborative projectsthen, learners should ideally be pre-pared for team roles and responsibili-ties and resolving typical teamproblems.

Terry Morris, associate professor atWilliam Rainey Harper College in Pala-tine, Illinois, uses her “Working inTeams” module (http://terrymorris.net/teamwork/) to help learners in hercourses understand team roles, how tobe a good team member, and how toresolve conflicts. Consider havinglearners use this resource (or build oneof your own). After learners have usedit, facilitate an online discussion aboutgood collaborative experiences, includ-ing what made them good or not so

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Improving Results and ReducingFrustrations from TeamActivities

By Patti Shank, PhD, CPT

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good and how to prevent the not-so-good ones.

Team agreementsOnce teams are formed and the stu-

dents have some understanding ofwhat is expected, it’s really importantthat they document their understand-ing, so all team members are on thesame page and can refer back to theagreement as needed. To facilitate this,teams should construct their first col-laborative assignment, a formal teamagreement.

Joanna C. Dunlap, assistant profes-sor in the School of Education andHuman Development, University ofColorado at Denver and Health ScienceCenter, has each team answer the fol-lowing questions (and I adapted herlist to include a few of my own):

• Will they will have a leader, and ifso, who this will be, and will thisrole will be rotated?

• How will work be distributed? Whowill do what? Who is the desig-nated backup?

• What work style do they agree to?• Are there any known problems or

problematic dates or times thatneed to be factored in?

• When and how will they “meet”and communicate with each other?How often?

• How will iteration and version con-trol get handled?

• Who will post the team deliver-ables?

• How will they provide constructivefeedback to each other?

• How will they handle work that issub par, incomplete, or not done?

The instructor ideally should reviewteam agreements and provide feedbackon agreements that aren’t specificenough or otherwise unlikely to workwell. It’s a good idea to not allowteams to proceed with other team as-signments until a solid and workableteam agreement that all members ofthe team support is in place.

Team assessmentsWell-thought-out team agreements

can greatly reduce team problems, butthey may not eliminate them. As a re-sult, it’s a good idea to set up a formalmechanism for team members to pro-vide feedback to each other. In addi-tion to providing valuable input abouthow each team member is meetingteam commitments, if completedthroughout the course, this allows alllearners time to adjust their behaviorswhile it can still make a positive differ-ence.

Dr. Dunlap uses teamwork assess-ments at various points in her onlinecourses. The results of these assess-ments impact individual grades forteam assignment when assessmentsshow that a team member is not fulfill-ing commitments. For example, shemay lower team deliverable grades foranyone who receives less than 50 per-cent of the allowable points from morethan one team member. Here are someof the questions Dunlap uses in herteam assessments.

Does this team member• accept responsibility for tasks de-

termined by the team?• respect differences of opinion and

backgrounds?• provide positive feedback of team

member accomplishments?• keep in contact with team mem-

bers for the purpose of maintainingteam cohesion and collaboration?

• meet team deadlines?

This process empowers team mem-bers to have a say in the grade distribu-tion on team assignments. Everyone onthe team receiving an identical gradedespite inadequate contributions bysome team members is one of thebiggest complaints from learners aboutteam assignments. The team assess-ment process also lets the instructorknow what additional support he orshe needs to provide to teams and indi-vidual team members.

Your turnConsider adapting the ideas in this

article to your team assignments inorder to have greater benefits and fewerfrustrations. Also, consider working onthese ideas collaboratively with otheronline instructors and instructional de-signers in your institution so that allcan benefit from the collaboration.

Patti Shank, PhD, CPT, is a widely rec-ognized instructional designer and in-structional technologist, writer, andauthor who builds and helps othersbuild good online and blended coursesand facilitated learning. She can bereached through her website,www.learningpeaks.com. @


FROM PAGE 9

The Benefits of Active Learningin a Collaborative Environment

According to Jan Engle, collabora-tive active learning

• develops higher-level thinkingskills—students think throughthe topics more thoroughly,

• encourages exploration of alterna-tive perspectives and solutions,

• stimulates critical thinking andhelps students clarify ideas

through discussion and debate,and

• generates solutions that are typi-cally better than what one stu-dent can develop workingindividually—particularly if theproject is complex.

This type of learning also helps de-velop the following ancillary skills:

a. Teamwork skills

b. Negotiating skillsc. Feedback skillsd. Communication skillse. Project management skillsf. Interpersonal skills; skills in

dealing with diversity

Students also learn strategies forlearning by interacting and observingteam members.

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Jan Engle, coordinator of instructiondevelopment at Governors State Uni-

versity, uses group work in her onlinecourses with an initial emphasis onprocess and, as a course progresses, agrowing emphasis on product.

One of the biggest problems withdoing group projects online (and face-to-face) is student resistance. “One ofthe best ways to overcome resistance isobviously for students to have a posi-tive experience. Unfortunately, many ofthem come into an online class havinghad a very negative experience withgroup work. Almost always, those neg-ative experiences stem from problemswhere they’ve been on teams wherethey ended up doing most of the workand other people did nothing andeverybody got the same grade,” Englesays.

To prevent this inequity, Engle makesparticipation in group work mandatoryand uses peer evaluation to encourageequal participation. Grades consist oftwo elements: the group grade of theproduct itself and a grade for participa-tion (based on peer review).

Engle provides a rubric for peer eval-uation. Failure to participate in groupprojects is an automatic one-coursegrade deduction. “I do that primarilybecause really bad group experiencesand failure to participate in the onlineenvironment just decimate the sense ofcommunity we’ve worked so hard todevelop up to that point,” she says.

Preliminary group projects in Engle’scourses tend to be relatively easy andfun, in order to emphasize groupprocesses. “Before you actually launcha project, it’s important to make sureearly on that everybody knows who’sdoing what and that they have contin-

gency plans,” she says. “And if theyhave nonparticipating members, I givegroups the ability to fire a member, sothat they are not continually spendingall of their energy trying to chasesomeone who is not going to partici-pate anyhow.”

If students in her course have notdone online group work before, Engleintroduces the project and then, if pos-sible, gives the students a relativelyeasy team task before they take onmore complex team projects. She offerssuggestions on using threaded discus-sion and chat and asks students to ad-dress the following organizationalissues:

• How are you going to divide theproject so that each team memberhas a part?

• Who is going to be responsible foreach part?

• How are you going to communicateduring the project?

• How will members submit theirwork to the group?

• What is the deadline for the sub-missions of individual pieces?

• Who is going to be responsible forputting the pieces together intoone paper?

• How are you going to handle finalproofing?

• What will you do if somebody doesnot do his or her part or does notmeet deadlines?

• How are you going to go about an-swering questions that group mem-bers might have about the project?

Engle also monitors all groups bymaking herself a member of every dis-cussion group. “Early on, I’m paying

attention to groups in which I’m notseeing any activity,” she says. “If I’mnot seeing any activity in the discus-sion thread, then I’ll post a message tothat group, saying something such as,‘It looks like you’re getting off to aslow start. Are there any problems thatyou need help with?’ It’s kind of a gen-tle nudge so that if there really areproblems, that tends to bring themforward.”

Engle encourages her students tosend her private emails to alert her toproblems; however, she makes it apoint to have the students resolveproblems in the threaded discussions.“I’m not solving their problems. I’m re-ally helping facilitate their resolution ofthe problem. There’s a tendency as aninstructor to want to solve their prob-lems, but that just doesn’t work. Youjust really have to get in, and I mighttry to encourage. I may do it through adiscussion thread. I might suggest thatwe have a team chat where we can getin and talk about the issues and getthem resolved.”

Project designAn important consideration in incor-

porating group work into an onlinecourse is making sure that it suits thegoals of the course and that it makes“authentic use of the content that’sbeing presented,” Engle says. “If youuse group work simply for the sake ofincorporating group work, you’re prob-ably not going to create an engagingexercise.”

One of Engle’s most successful groupprojects was a scavenger hunt for anintroduction to online learning course.Leading up to the scavenger hunt, stu-dents learned about search engines,search strategies, Boolean logic, andthe relative merits of different searchengines for different purposes.

“In this course, I wanted to makesure that the students had an opportu-nity to do virtual group work, and Ialso wanted them to be using this con-tent knowledge from this unit on find-


How to Promote CollaborativeActive Online Learning

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ing information on the Internet,” Englesays.

The scavenger hunt consisted of 50esoteric trivia questions that studentswere not likely to know the answers to.Each group consisted of five students,so each student in each group was re-sponsible for 10 questions. Each teamcaptain submitted answers to the ques-tions through WebCT’s quiz tool. Thegrade for the project was based on thenumber of correct questions, and Englegave extra credit to the group that fin-ished first with the most correct an-swers and to the group thatdemonstrated the most effective team-work.

Teams were required to use threadeddiscussion or chat, which enabledEngle to monitor group interaction andmade communication within thegroups less confusing than using emailwould have done.

In an online graduate course in on-line learning, Engle makes it a point tocreate group projects that are commonto all students but are not in any onestudent’s field of expertise. When shefirst tried this approach, some studentsfelt that it was a waste of time to de-sign solutions that were of no interestto them. “It was clear to me that theyweren’t understanding that, in orderfor everybody to design and see alter-nate design strategies, they had to belooking at something that is commonto everybody in the group,” Engle says.She explained to them, “If I were sim-ply to say, ‘Pick something from yourown subject matter and do this proj-ect,’ then the ability for other people tocompare solutions doesn’t exist.”

Contact Jan Engle at [email protected].

Close your eyes and see if you canrecollect your high school algebra

class. Do you remember who sat in theseat in front of you? Now, remember acollege history or economics course.Where did you sit?

If your recollections are anything likemine, you were probably sitting at adesk in a classroom or lecture hall, tak-ing notes, while the teacher lecturedand scribbled words on the blackboard.Lecture-driven courses with individualassessments and deliverables such astests and reports were the norm. Work-ing together in groups may have beenacceptable in some situations (e.g.,study groups) but not in others (e.g.,writing papers). All in all, collaborationdidn’t loom large in most teachers’ in-structional strategies toolboxes.

As a result of your own experiences,you may not have considered collabo-rative activities for the courses youteach. Even if you understand the ben-efits of collaborative activities, re-designing your courses to include themmay seem daunting. You may also havequestions about how to monitor andgrade such activities. And you mayhave heard complaints from other in-structors about the problems they havefaced with collaborative activities. Eas-ier to just stay with the same ole, sameole, right?

Because collaboration has criticalbenefits for learning, I’m going to ex-plain in this and the next few articles,the rationale for using them, what newonline tools may be valuable, how todesign good collaborative activities,and how to avoid common problems.We’ll start with the potential benefitsand typical ways to employ collabora-tive activities.

The benefits of collaborativeactivities

Research studies clearly indicate thatlearning benefits can accrue from col-laborative learning activities. They de-scribe ways that social interaction canpositively influence learning, motiva-tion, and problem solving, and canhelp learners gain needed support andovercome frustration. In onlinecourses, especially, social interactionand collaborative activities can helplearners avoid feelings of isolation andimprove motivation and persistence.

Changes in the nature of the work-place have put an increased emphasison teamwork, group cognition, andcollective decision making. Much oftoday’s work isn’t predictable or rou-tine, as it was 50 years ago. Work inthis era of knowledge and informationincreasingly involves

• tasks done alongside other tasksand under complex conditions anddistractions,

• competing demands and the needto continually prioritize and repri-oritize, and

• complex decisions made withchanging and sometimes contradic-tory information.

As a result, the development of criti-cal-thinking skills, sharing, and collab-orative decision making is increasinglycalled for in instructional environ-ments. Effective collaboration, likemost other skills, takes time, practice,and feedback.

Here are some assumptions aboutlearning that explain why these bene-fits occur.

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Considering Collaboration

By Patti Shank, PhD, CPT

PAGE 13!

FROM PAGE 11

1. Learning is social. We learn inorder to participate in the spheresof influence we are involved in orwish to be involved in. Joint in-quiry and meaning making oftenleads to greater understanding forall.

2. Learning is active. Learning re-quires meaningful activity and in-tegration of new ideas with what isalready known. Collaboration canhelp learners better organize andintegrate new information.

3. Ideal learning activities are realor realistic. Collaborative learningactivities can be designed to mirrorreal or realistic activities, leadingto enhanced engagement andlearning. Collaboration can helplearners deal with realistic levels ofcomplexity, including differencesof opinion and group decisionmaking.

4. Ideas of others are beneficial. Incollaborative activities, learners in-evitably encounter differences. Ne-gotiating these differences buildsimportant capabilities such as un-derstanding, tolerating, or resolv-ing differences. These are crucialtwenty-first century life and workskills.

At their best, collaborative activitiesinvolve taking responsibility for one’sideas and contributions and havingsensitivity to the ideas and goals ofothers. In this way, they mirror the re-ality of living in a world where sharinginformation and understanding theviews of others is often critical.

Collaborative activitiesThe table on the next page lists some

of the more common types of collabo-rative activities and describes how toimplement them in online courses.

Collaborative activities can engagelearners and help them learn. This isespecially important in online coursesbecause learners need to overcome theinevitable issues that arise when learn-ers and instructors are separated by

time and space.It takes preparation and practice to

design and implement good collabora-tive activities, and learners needpreparation and practice to get themost from them. Hopefully the exam-ples in the table have provided youwith a few ideas for collaborative activ-ities in your courses. Another way tofind good ideas is from colleagues whohave successfully implemented collab-orative activities.

Collaborative activities can modelwhat it means to learn from and withothers, being sensitive to how othersview the world, and taking responsibil-ity for more than your own outcomes.

ReferencesAnderson, T. (2002, October 3). Get-

ting the mix right again: An updatedand theoretical rationale for interaction.Message posted to ITFORUM mailinglist, archived at http://it.coe.uga.edu/it-forum/ paper63/paper63.htm.

Brown, J. S., and Duguid, P. (1989).Situated cognition and the culture oflearning. Educational Researcher, 18(1),32-42.

Moore, M. G. (1993). Three types ofinteraction. In K. Harry, M. John, andD. Keegan (Eds.), Distance education:New perspectives (pp. 12-24). London:Routledge.

O’Reilly, M., and Newton, D. (2002).Interaction online: Above and beyondrequirements of assessment. AustralianJournal of Educational Technology,18(1), 57-70.

Palloff, R. N., and Pratt, K. (2004).Collaborating online: Learning togetherin community. San Francisco, CA:Jossey-Bass.

Patti Shank, PhD, CPT, is a widely rec-ognized instructional designer and in-structional technologist, writer, andauthor, who builds and helps othersbuild good online and blended coursesto facilitate learning. She can bereached through her website:www.learningpeaks.com. @


Collaborative ActiveLearning Advice

Jan Engle offers the followingadvice for online instructors look-ing to incorporate collaborativeactive learning in their courses:

• Start with simple collaborativeprojects until you get a feel forhow to structure and facilitatecollaborative exercises.

• Avoid introducing group proj-ects too early in the course,unless they are VERY basic.

• Provide specific, clearinstructions.

• Provide tips for success (bothfor virtual communicationprocess and for group work).Don’t assume that studentsknow how to do group projects.

• Do not abandon students duringthis time … you still need tobe available to guide andencourage groups.

• Allow plenty of time.• If you are going to do a very

sophisticated group project inthe class, try to introduce asimple exercise earlier in thecourse to allow groups todevelop a group process thatwill support the more complexproject that comes later.

FROM PAGE 12


Activity Description Online Course Example

Caseanalysis

A detailed story of a real or realistic situ-ation is introduced, along with a problemthat learners can analyze and resolve.

Small groups of learners collaboratively analyze an injury case and identifymeasures that may be undertaken to prevent or reduce the damages fromthis type of injury.

Collaborativewriting

Small groups of learners create a writtendeliverable.

The learners in the case analysis group write a joint position paper on themost promising measures for preventing and reducing damages from thistype of injury.

Peer help

Learners post questions and call on thediversity of people resources to get help.The questions also provide the instructorwith opportunities to assess problemsand progress.

The course help discussion forum in the object-oriented programmingcourse allows learners to post questions and get help from other learnersand the instructor. As a result, questions are often answered quickly andcreatively.

Knowledgebase

Learners maintain a knowledge base tohelp them deal with typical problems en-countered in the course content.

The intro-to-statistics course uses Web forms and a database to maintain alist of common issues and problems, and solutions for each of them.

Resourcedatabase

Learners find, share, tag, and maintain alist of favorite resources.

An online database has been created by the lead instructor for learners en-rolled in the Web development certificate course. Learners in the programuse, maintain, and add to it as part of their course activities.

Peer editing

Learners exchange draft versions ofcourse deliverables (papers, Web sites,spreadsheets, etc.) and get feedbackfrom each other in order to improvethem.

Learners in a public health course write a paper on whether public healthworkers should advocate for the prevention of accidents (such as mandat-ing motorcycle helmets). They share their papers with two other learnerswho provide feedback on the quality of their argument and writing.

Onlinediscussions

Asynchronous dialogue is used for shar-ing and negotiating understanding.

A business law course includes two online discussion topics in the asyn-chronous course discussion forums each week. One discussion is initiatedby the instructor. Another is initiated by one of the small groups that areformed at the beginning of the course.

Preparing students for the onlinelearning experience and managing

expectations are critical to student sat-isfaction, says Marie Gould, assistantprofessor and program manager ofBusiness Administration, and DenisePadavano, associate professor and pro-gram manager, Information Technol-ogy, both of Peirce College.

Students at Peirce College (whetherthey are face-to-face or online stu-dents) are required to take a one-creditonline course that gives an overview ofhow the college works and helps de-velop students’ time management andstudy skills. The course uses eCollege,the same course management systemused for online, hybrid, Web-supportedcourses at the college.

By the time students enroll in theirregular courses (which are acceleratedseven-week courses), they have aworking knowledge of eCollege and agood idea of what to expect. But man-aging expectations needs to go beyondusing the technology.

The following are suggestions byGould and Padavano for improving stu-dent satisfaction:

• Post the course syllabus on theWeb. Part of managing expecta-tions is letting students know upfront how the course is organized.

• Administer a learning-styles in-ventory. For each of her courses,Gould uses a learning-styles inven-tory as an icebreaker activity, andbecause group work is a requiredcomponent of her courses, she hasstudents share their results of theinventory. “When the students seethe strengths and weaknesses of

each person, they tend to delegateroles and responsibilities based onthe strengths of each of their learn-ing styles,” Gould says.

• Explain the importance of groupwork. Because some students mayobject to working in groups, stu-dents need to see how they willbenefit from group work. “We haveto try to get students to focus onwhy we want them to work inteams. We’re not just putting theminto teams because we want tomake them suffer. [Teamwork] is acritical skill that students need tolearn so they are functional whenthey get out and work. We need tohelp them get over that fear andmanage expectations,” Padavanosays.

• Use team contracts. Major obsta-cles to group work are finding thetime for students to work togetherand defining each group member’sroles and responsibilities. Gouldhas each group develop a teamcontract that outlines how andwhen the group will work together.Interaction options include email,threaded discussion, text-basedchat, document sharing, and audiobridging.

• Use a variety of assessments.Points should be spread evenlyacross different assessments be-cause some students might notperform well on tests while othersmight not write very well.

• Be flexible. “I might have guide-lines and even assignments pre-pared, but depending on themakeup of the class and students’learning styles and personalities, Imight have to adjust some things,”

Padavano says. “If you find thatthe class is quiet, you can becomemore active. If you find that thestudents are very active, you canstep back. You can facilitate basedon the way that the students areparticipating in the course.”

• Provide frequent interaction. In-structors need to be responsive tostudents’ needs—Padavano recom-mends a 24-hour response time tostudents’ questions—but interac-tion is not solely the responsibilityof the instructor. Students alsoneed to interact with each otherand with the content. “Studentsneed to touch the content everyday. They want to know howthey’re doing, and they want toknow quickly. They want to knowthe faculty member is there andthat he or she cares about the stu-dents.”

Contact Marie Gould at [email protected] and Denise Padavano [email protected]. @


7 Ways to Improve StudentSatisfaction in Online Courses

When Margaret Anderson, a psy-chology professor at the State

University of New York at Cortland,began teaching online 12 years ago, sheused an open-source communicationtool to facilitate online discussions. Shelater moved to WebCT when the collegedecided to stop supporting the open-source product for security reasons. ButWebCT did not provide her with theflexibility she needed, so she found anew open-source communication tool—LiveJournal.

LiveJournal is a blogging tool that hashelped Anderson to work around sev-eral shortcomings of WebCT. WebCT’sdiscussion feature works well for dis-cussions among those enrolled in acourse, but Anderson wanted to opencertain discussions to former students,interns’ site supervisors, and colleaguesin similar departments at other institu-tions (including several overseas).

Anderson chose LiveJournal becauseit is free, easy to use, and allows usersto change security settings to enablevariable access. She takes full advantageof the ability to change security settingsto provide different access—individual,instructor, class group, entire class, se-lect individuals outside the class, andeven the entire online community—tosuit specific communication needs.

At the beginning of her courses, theclass as a whole has access to LiveJour-nal to build a sense of community anddiscuss issues that are pertinent to allthe students. Each of these discussionslasts for two weeks. Anderson posts aquestion in the first week, and studentsrespond directly to the question. In thesecond week, students continue the dis-cussion. (The discussion can extend be-yond two weeks, but it is not required.)

For discussions that are relevant be-yond the students in a particular course,Anderson may invite colleagues andstudents from similar courses at otherinstitutions to participate. For example,a discussion on how states are imple-menting laws related to No Child LeftBehind might benefit from the perspec-tives of education students in differentstates or even the perspectives of abroader group. (Anderson reserves in-teraction with the general public for theend of the term.)

Anderson has students use LiveJour-nal for group work as well. In these in-stances, she can easily set up groups bychanging the security settings to restrictaccess to certain students.

She also conducts one-on-one com-munication with her students by creat-ing groups consisting of herself andeach individual student. She uses thismainly for student journal entries basedon each class session. In the past, shewould ask students to submit their jour-nals every two weeks for her to review.The problem with that method was thatoften students would write several jour-nal entries just before they were duerather than writing them after eachclass session. With LiveJournal, how-ever, each entry is date stamped.

For interns, Anderson is able to do“virtual observations,” in which shecan have students post artifacts of theirwork, such as audio or video files. An-derson also opens these intern blogs tothe student’s site supervisor, whichprovides more insight into the stu-dent’s experiences.

The archives of these blogs providestudents with a record of their learning,which they can use to create electronicportfolios, Anderson says. “I have stu-

dents who have worked with me forthree semesters, and they’ll look back attheir first year’s journal and say, ‘Wow!I didn’t remember that.’ In that sense Ido like it because it provides opportuni-ties for reflection.”

Use of these blogs also benefits stu-dents after the class has ended, by pro-viding them with experience using a toolthat they might be able to adapt to thecourses they teach in the future. “Mostof my students are currently teachers,and they hear a lot about the use oftechnology but don’t necessarily see it inaction. So for a lot of them this is model-ing a tool that they can use in their ownclasses. One of the reasons I prefer thisto something like WebCT or any of theproprietary course management systemsis that if a high school or middle schoolteacher uses this system in my class,students can replicate it on their ownbecause it’s free,” Anderson says.

When considering a tool such as Live-Journal or other blogging platforms, An-derson recommends that you carefullyconsider the needs of the course. “Peda-gogy needs to drive the technology use.I love to look at new toys and newthings out there, but I want to knowwhat the needs of my course are, andwhat is the best technology to meetthose needs?”

Before using a blogging platform, con-sider who will have access to each blogbefore the course begins, to avoid hav-ing to change security settings, whichcan be cumbersome. It also helps toadopt standard user name conventionsto make it easier to grant access to spe-cific forums. For example, for studentsenrolled in her Psychology 501 course,Anderson has students log in as 501last-name to enable her to easily sort users.

One of the disadvantages of usingopen-source tools is that you may nothave on-campus technical support forthem. However, in the case of LiveJour-nal, there are “excellent” user groupsand FAQs to help with technical issuesthat arise, Anderson says.

Contact Margaret Anderson at [email protected]. @


Open-Source Blog PlatformProvides Much-NeededCommunication Flexibility

Students’ sense of isolation is oftencited as one of the reasons for low

retention rates in online classes. Oneway to combat this is to build groupwork into your online class. In doingso, you will most likely also improveretention and increase student learn-ing. When built properly, group proj-ects will also require students to usehigher-level critical-thinking and prob-lem-solving skills.

Creating the groupsDeciding on how to group the stu-

dents can be very important to thegroups’ success. Students may be ran-domly assigned to groups or assignedbased upon their interests, their skilllevels, their learning style, or their par-ticipation levels.

There are several methods for ran-domly creating groups. Many coursemanagement software packages in-clude an option for randomly assigningstudents to groups. Another way to di-vide students is to have the instructormanually assign students to groupsbased on the course list. So the firststudent alphabetically would be as-signed to group one, the second personalphabetically would be assigned togroup two, etc.

Assigning students to groups basedon a common interest is a great way tohave students tackle controversial is-sues. To group students with commoninterests the instructor could provide alist of topics and have the students signup electronically or through email forthe topic they wish to discuss. To en-courage critical thinking, the instructorcould assign students to take the oppo-site position on the topic.

Giving students a technology skills

assessment and grouping them by sim-ilar skills for group work is a great wayto lessen the intimidation many stu-dents feel when their skill level isn’t ashigh as that of their classmates. On theother hand, if the group were to de-velop some sort of technology-richproduct as part of the group work, e.g.,a Web page or brochure, grouping stu-dents with a range of technical abilitieswould make for a more successfulgroup project. Students could assigneach other tasks, and the students withthe better technical skills could be re-sponsible for developing the final prod-uct.

Grouping students by learning styleis a great way of giving students theopportunity to develop projects thatbest fit specific styles. For instance, ina nutrition class the instructor couldhave a group of kinesthetic learners de-velop a Web page on one of the vita-mins, have a group of auditorystudents develop and record a jingleabout one of the vitamins, and have athird group of visual learners write apaper or create a flyer for one of the vi-tamins.

In addition to these methods of creat-ing groups, instructors can use dataprovided by their learning managementsystem (LMS) to group students. MostLMS packages track student participa-tion. Assigning students who partici-pate early and often to the samesection can circumvent the problem ofrandom groupings that result in one ortwo group members doing all thework.

Developing group projectsThe following are three group proj-

ects used in an educational technology

class to encourage community build-ing.

Group Project 1: Online DiscussionAs a future teacher it is important

that you become familiar with keyissues affecting technology in publicschools. Using the discussion guide-lines, tips, and rubric, accomplish thefollowing:

1. Locate the topic that has beenassigned to you.

a. Do schools need more com-puters or more teachers? John,Maria

b. Is technology further wideningthe gap between rich andpoor? William, Julie

c. Is technology further wideningthe gap between males andfemales? Jessica, Scott

d. Should technology resourcesbe focused on basic skills orhigher-level thinking? Shan-non, Pat

2. Decide if you agree or disagreewith the statement.

3. Locate two Web sources thatsupport your position.

4. Write a brief essay (approximately200 to 400 words) expressing yourpoint of view.

5. Identify, by quote, the point orpoints from the Web resourcesthat support your position andelaborate on your point of view.

6. Go to the discussion board and se-lect the Assignment 2: DiscussionQuestions topic.

7. Please put your name, the letter ofyour topic, and a brief descriptionin the subject line of your mes-sage, e.g., Julie’s Topic B: Rich orPoor.

8. List the hyperlinks for the twowebsites you found.

9. Write out the topic question beforeyou write your answer in yourposting. This will help us focus onthe content and keep things inorder. (This is due by April 21.)

10. Reply to at least three other stu-


Building Community in OnlineClasses through Group Work

By Roxann Humbert, EdD

PAGE 18!

dents’ postings, one for your as-signed topic and one for each oftwo other topics. For instance,John will respond to Maria’s post-ing and to one person in topic cand one in topic d. Review the re-sponses of your fellow classmates.Ask questions to clarify any of theinformation that you don’t under-stand. Post your comments, ques-tions, and reactions asappropriate. You are not expectedto comment on everyone’s post-ings—only those that interest you(but a minimum of three). (Thisis due by April 24.)

Group Project 2: Group JustificationFor this assignment you will become

the expert on a computer input or out-put device, develop criteria for select-ing a computer input or output device,and write a justification to your schoolboard for purchasing this device. Usethe device assigned to you:

• Scanner—Richard• Graphics Tablet—Joyce• Digital Camera—Victoria

Part 1: Locate two Internet sources ofreviews for your device.Part 2: Develop at least a 12-item rat-ing instrument to evaluate your device.Part 3: Use your instrument to evaluatetwo brands/models of your device.Record your results in an Excel spread-sheet.Part 4: Write a two-paragraph justifica-tion to your school board for purchas-ing the device. Post your spreadsheetand justification to the Input/OutputDevice forum.Part 5: Select the justification for theclassmate listed below you and decidewhether or not you would allow themto purchase the device and why. Postyour response as a reply to their origi-nal posting in the Input/Output Deviceforum.

Group Project 3: Paired GroupsFor this assignment I have divided

the class into pairs.

Group 1: Richard, JessicaGroup 2: Michelle, Victoria

You will be working as a group to de-velop a checklist to conduct a technol-ogy inventory for a public school. Yourinstrument should contain the follow-ing parts:

• Part 1: Identification information,e.g., date of assessment, schoolname, etc.

• Part 2: Computer hardware infor-mation, i.e., number and types ofcomputers found in the school.

• Part 3: Local Area Networks(LANs) installed in school, i.e.,type and location of networks.

• Part 4: Network elements currentlyused, e.g., wireless, Ethernet, etc.

• Part 5: School- and countywideservers, e.g., file servers, Webservers, mail servers, etc.

• Part 6: Operating systems, e.g.,MacOS, MS-DOS, Windows, etc.

• Part 7: Connectivity technologiesand sources, e.g., modems, T1lines, ATMs, cable, etc.

1. You are welcome to contacteach other using whatevermeans you feel most comfort-able with, but doing the proj-ect fully online will be moremeaningful and fun for you. Ihave set up a private discus-sion topic—one for each pair.You are welcome to use thesediscussion areas to communi-cate and collaborate on yourprojects. Your group also has achat area.

2. I have access to your privategroup discussions so I canmonitor your collaborativegroup efforts. I will not partici-pate in your groups’ discus-sions unless you specificallyask for my help. If you chooseto communicate via regularemail, please CC me on yourmessages. The reason for thisis that unless you include mein your loop, I will have noway to assess your group’scollaboration.

3. As a group, decide on thetechnology you will use todevelop your checklist, e.g.,Microsoft Word, HTML, etc.

4. Post your group’s collectiveassignment to the technologyinventory discussion board onor before the date scheduledon the course calendar for re-view by other class members.I will give feedback to yourteam on your project shortlythereafter.

5. You will use your group’s pri-vate discussion forum to com-municate with each other.

6. The collaborative group proj-ect rubric will be used to eval-uate the first 80 points of thisassignment.

7. Evaluate the effectiveness ofyour group. There is a maxi-mum of 20 points for this partof the assignment, and eachmember of your group will re-ceive a possible 15 out of theassigned points for submittingthe group project critique. Theremaining five points evaluateyour individual contributionsto the group project. The lastquestion in the review asksyou to highlight your contribu-tions to the group project. Tellme how many of the fivepoints you feel you earned.

These are just a few examples ofwhat instructors can do to build asense of community in online courses.Providing exercises and activities thatencourage group work and participa-tion help to maintain that sense ofcommunity.

Roxann Humbert is an associate profes-sor/director of learning technologies atFairmont State University. Contact herat [email protected]. @


FROM PAGE 17

Are you having trouble getting vir-tual team members to contribute

equally to team projects? If so, perhapsyou should try varying the membershipof these teams because, according to astudy by Brian Dineen (see referencebelow), doing so can reduce the issueof social loafing, where team membersrely on other group members to do thework for them.

Dineen formed groups in a large,upper-division organizational behaviorclass and gave members the option ofworking face to face, by telephone, oronline. He opted for this model be-cause he felt it closely replicated condi-tions now common in professionalcontexts. Employees work with othersin a virtual environment, and fre-quently, as tasks evolve, membershipin working groups changes.

Dineen provides complete logisticaldetails for the assignment, includingthe following important elements thatwere used: groups were made up ofthree to five members; for each of eightweeks they analyzed short cases rele-vant to course material and answeredtwo questions related to the case; andgroup work, which counted for one-fourth of their grade, included a peerevaluation component. Even thoughstudents had the option of meetingface-to-face or by phone, 70 percent re-ported that they completed the entireexercise without ever meeting face-to-face. Instead, they used private bulletinboards that the instructor set up forthem within WebCT.

For comparative purposes, Dineenkept membership in half of the 26groups stable. Those students workedtogether from start to finish on theproject. In the other groups, Dineen

changed group membership weekly; inthe second week, groups gained andlost one member, and in the third andfourth weeks they gained and lost twomembers. Students did not know howlong they would be in the group. Theysimply received an email announcingthat they had been reassigned to an-other group. They could no longer ac-cess their previous group’s bulletinboard and were given access to a newone.

Dineen looked at the impact of thisgroup work design across a number ofdifferent variables. He collected datafrom students before the experience,on weekly surveys and on the anony-mous end-of-course evaluation. Fromthe data gathered, Dineen discoveredthat most of those who responded tothe surveys did not have previousgroup experience in a virtual environ-ment. The inexperienced group re-ported significantly higher degrees oflearning outcomes and confidence thanthose who had worked in virtualgroups before.

Dineen explains the reduction of so-cial loafing by citing other researchdocumenting that when groups containstrangers, team members tend to be ontheir best behavior because they aresomewhat inhibited by people theydon’t know. Quantitative data indi-cated that social loafing was isolated toless than 5 percent of possible cases.However, levels of cohesion reportedby group members were higher inthose groups with stable membership.Interestingly, students in groups withfluid membership did not report lowerlevels of internal communication or de-creases in their perceived abilities toinfluence group decision making.

Also of note were some findings re-lated to extraverted and introvertedteam members. Results “show that in-troverts actually felt more influencethan extraverts during this exercise andperceived a greater cohesiveness andbetter internal communication.” Thisfinding held true regardless of whethergroup membership was stable or fluid.(p. 613) Dineen suspects that the vir-tual environment somehow “levels theplaying field,” making it easier for in-troverts to contribute during group in-teractions. “This is important becauseit suggests that conducting online teamexercises might bring more equivalentcontributions from all team members.”(p. 613)

This article is exemplary not only forthe creative design of the group work,but also for the comprehensive way inwhich the impact of the approach wasanalyzed and assessed. This is an im-pressive piece of practitioner pedagogi-cal scholarship.

Reference: Dineen, B. R. (2005).TeamXchange: A team project experi-ence involving virtual teams and fluidteam membership. Journal of Manage-ment Education, 29(4), 593–616. @


Study: Changing Virtual TeamMembership ImprovesParticipation

Many instructors use group work intheir courses. I especially like to

use group work for adults as it helps todraw upon their varied experiences.Unfortunately, adding group work toaccelerated adult programs creates ad-ditional challenges. Less face-to-facecontact, a characteristic of many accel-erated courses, can lead to added pres-sure to cover course content. Addingoutside group-related assignmentscould be perceived as undermining theadult-friendly nature of accelerated pro-grams and lead to student resistance,especially for those students with full-time careers, families, and long com-mutes to and from class. A possiblealternative to face-to-face group work isthe use of online discussion groups.

I taught an accelerated, eight-week,once-a-week child development courseto non-traditionally aged students. In aneffort to increase group work and offerexperiential learning without requiringmore face-to-face time, I added an on-line component to enhance the childobservation requirement of the course.

Discussion groups and learning com-munities have been suggested as nec-essary for effective learning andstudent satisfaction in online courses(Rossman 1999). An online format, es-pecially one of an asynchronous na-ture, eliminates the need for adultstudents to return to campus or be-come confined to others' work or homeschedules. According to Presby (2002),online discussion groups, especiallyused in combination with face-to-faceinteraction, have many positive out-comes. However, online discussiongroups are not without criticism, in-cluding lack of interpersonal communi-cation and miscommunication

(Jonassen, Davidson, Collins, Camp-bell, and Haag 1995), lack of focus andplanning (Presby 2002), and apprehen-sion of and opposition to technology(Cooper 2000; Presby 2002). Carefulplanning and continued evaluation caneffectively address these issues.

MethodAfter reviewing the literature on how

to foster interaction among studentsoutside of the classroom, I added anonline discussion component to thecourse. Objectives of this course re-quire students to complete child obser-vations. Online group work seemed abeneficial means for enhancing the ob-servation requirement.

Each student observed two childrenat different stages of development. I di-vided the class into eight, three-mem-ber groups in which students discussedthe similarities and differences of theirchildren, relating information obtainedfrom the textbook and the classroom tothe observations. These discussionstook place online between face-to-faceclass meetings using a course manage-ment system. Because some re-searchers suggest face-to-faceorientations to online assignments(Cooper 2000; Presby 2002), I demon-strated the use of the course manage-ment system during the first classmeeting, suggesting how studentswould effectively use it to post assign-ments and interact and attempting tosuspend any student opposition andapprehension regarding technology.

During the online assignment, groupmembers commented on each mem-ber's observations, helping to deter-mine if each child was followingtypical development patterns, com-

menting on each child’s uniqueness,and relating course and text informa-tion the observer may have missed.Each group discussed the observationswith the goal of group support to makeconnections between the observations,text, and class discussions. The groupsthen completed short class presenta-tions every two weeks to update theentire class on their progress.

The online assignment was gradedon thoroughness of individual memberobservations, substance of the com-ments from each member, and timeli-ness of completion. Students were thengiven an anonymous survey to evalu-ate the online assignment. The surveyconsisted of 21 questions, rated on ascale of one to five (strongly disagreeto strongly agree). Students were al-lowed to offer additional comments onthe survey.

Results and discussionStudents viewed the child observa-

tion experience as a positive learningexperience, which supports our depart-ment’s philosophy of experientiallearning. Additionally, most studentsbelieved group work contributed to theexperience. Of the eight groups, I feelsix performed well with group mem-bers being supportive, offering advice,making connections to the course con-tent, and taking the assignment seri-ously. One group had a more difficulttime with the assignment and anothergroup, as a whole, did poorly. Thesetwo groups did poorly on this assign-ment due to a lack of member partici-pation and extreme lateness ofresponses, which was specific to theassignment as these instances did notnecessarily mirror overall course in-volvement.

Overall, both the students and Iviewed the online discussion groupspositively. As expected, based on theliterature and initial comments in theclassroom, many students were ini-tially apprehensive about the assign-ment, but a face-to-face orientation to


Facilitating Student Interactionwith Online Discussion GroupsBy Eric K. Cooper, PhD

PAGE 21!

the online system was beneficial in al-leviating student concerns about tech-nology and online discussions.Additionally, continued chances forquestions and answers helped alleviatestudent concerns. Students indicatedthe small groups were appropriate, andI found the small groups easy to moni-tor. However, some students com-mented that groups with only threemembers may have been too small.

Based on the results, students appre-ciated the convenience of the onlineformat without extra face-to-face meet-ings. Presby (2002) suggested shyerstudents would reflect on and partici-pate more in the online discussions.Although shyness was not addressed inthe survey, students tended to agreethey could reflect more on the assign-ment. Overall, students believed theaddition of the online assignment wasappropriate for an accelerated courseand suggested using the assignment inthe future.

The online discussion groups weredesigned to allow students to controland dictate the direction of the discus-sions. Jonassen, Davidson, Collins,Campbell, and Haag (1995) suggest theinstructor should remain absent or actonly as facilitator because instructorinvolvement may impede student col-laboration. Less instructor directionmoves student interaction to a muchdeeper level with better understandingand interaction (Caverly and MacDon-ald 2002). However, many of the stu-dents wanted more instructorinvolvement in the online discussions.More instructor involvement is sup-ported by much of the literature (e.g.,Swan 2002) and should be used, espe-cially in courses with higher levels ofapprehension surrounding online as-signments. For most of the students inthe class, this was their first foray intoonline work. The discussions shouldbecome more student-directed as stu-dents progress in a course, but aneight-week course did not allow suffi-cient time for transition.

The online discussion groups en-hanced the child observation experi-ence in the accelerated psychologycourse based on student perception.However, based on my experience dur-ing this assignment, it is important toplan the assignments carefully, antici-pate student questions, and post clearexpectations regarding online participa-tion and grading criteria. Also, it is im-portant to offer prompt feedback asstudents will expect immediate re-sponses online. Additionally, some ap-prehension surrounding the use oftechnology and the online environ-ment, especially from adult students,should be expected. It also may be nec-essary for the instructor to interactmore in the assignment discussionsthan originally intended. These resultsmay have been different with tradition-ally aged students.

Eric K. Cooper is assistant registrar andinstructor of psychology at Seton HillUniversity. Contact him at [email protected].

ReferencesCaverly, D. C., and L. MacDonald.

2002. Techtalk: Online learning com-munities. Journal of Developmental Ed-ucation, 25: 36-37.

Cooper, L. 2000. Anatomy of an on-line course. In J. J. Hirschbuhl, and D.Bishop, eds., Computers in education(9th ed., 204-208). Guilford, CT:Dushkin/McGraw-Hill.

Jonassen, D., M. Davidson, M.Collins, J. Campbell, and B. B. Haag.1995. Constructivism and computer-mediated communication in distanceeducation. American Journal of Dis-tance Education, 9: 7-26.

Presby, L. 2002. Seven tips for highlyeffective online courses. In J. J.Hirschbuhl, and D. Bishop, eds., Com-puters in education (10th ed., 217-218).Guilford, CT: McGraw-Hill/Dushkin.

Rossman, M. H. 1999. Successful on-line teaching using an asynchronouslearner discussion form. Journal ofAsynchronous Learning Networks, 3:91-97. Swan, K. 2002. Building learning

communities in online courses: Theimportance of interaction. Education,Communication, and Information,2:23-49. @


How to Reduce Social Loafing

In any group there is always thepotential for real or perceived in-

equity in the amount of work doneby individuals. This phenomenon isknown as social loafing. Unlike lurk-ing, which some would argue is avalid learning style, social loafingcan have major negative conse-quences for the learning team, suchas reduced motivation.

At this year’s Conference on Dis-tance Teaching & Learning, SherryPiezon, a doctoral student at FloridaState University, and William Ferree,manager of Web-enables programs atthe Naval War College, offered thefollowing recommendations for re-ducing this problem:

• Require high levels of accounta-bility

• Alternate group roles• Balance group member skills

and knowledge• Encourage discussions• Give meaningful feedback to the

group and individuals• Provide rewards for group per-

formance• Provide all groups with for per-

formance data from other groupsfor comparison

• Use a grading system that gives agroup grade and an individualgrade—the latter based on indi-vidual contribution to the finalproject and participation ingroup meetings

• Assign readings on group workprocesses

• Provide opportunities to increasecollaboration and publicize re-sults.

FROM PAGE 21

Changing workplace demands andstudent learning style preferences

require that instructors rethink theircourses. No longer can students pas-sively absorb knowledge. They mustbecome active learners — interactingwith peers and designing and imple-menting the learning, says Jane Legacy,MBA/MBE chair at Southern NewHampshire University’s School of Busi-ness.

Legacy uses active learning tech-niques such as group inquiry, onlinefield trips, asynchronous debate, andWeb quests in her online courses—inorganizational leadership and humanrelations, research and technology, andonline learning—to prepare studentsfor the types of learning situations theywill encounter on the job and to reflectthe changes in the ways students preferto learn. “If we want our students to besuccessful in the workplace, we’ve gotto model what we want them to belike,” Legacy says. “If the ultimate goalfor us is to prepare people to learn, un-learn, and relearn the rest of theirlives, they have to start having fun,and we need to make them account-able. And the only way we’re going togive them that opportunity is to not beso rigid with our instructions.”

In addition, Legacy says, today’s stu-dents are less interested in lectures andprefer more variety in the instructionalmethods used in a course. “They loveto be active participants in the learningprocess, and the research says also thatstudents learn better from other stu-dents than they do from teachers,”Legacy says.

Because of the changes in students’

preferred styles of learning, Legacy rec-ommends that instructors change in-structional strategies every 15 to 18minutes, whether the course is on cam-pus or online.

Legacy’s courses are set up as mod-ules on a Wednesday to Wednesdayschedule rather than Sunday to Sundayto give students more time on theweekends to complete their work. Eachmodule consists of 15-minute incre-ments. For example, students may readfor 15 minutes, then spend 15 minutesin a group activity, followed by 15 min-utes in the discussion forum. (A three-credit course typically requiresstudents to put in approximately ninehours a week.)

The first step in creating an activelearning environment online is to getstudents to relate what is going on inthe course to their lives, which helpsthem problem solve and think criti-cally, two skills that are essential in theworkplace.

This concept is played out in a vari-ety of ways in Legacy’s courses. Shebegins each course with a pre-assess-ment of students’ skills and abilities bytaking all the course’s learning out-comes and having each student ratehimself or herself on those outcomes.Legacy also does a personality assess-ment, and based on those two assess-ments, she puts students in groups sothat each group has a cross section ofskill levels and personality traits.

From the beginning of each course,each student’s work is visible online toothers in the course through an e-port-folio. Students also critique each oth-ers’ work using a set of rubrics. This

helps students be more creative in theirwork, and it also gives them ideas forhow to approach their own projects.“It’s all about students designing, im-plementing, and evaluating their ownwork using other people’s work as re-sources,” Legacy says.

Legacy also has a discussion board inBlackboard in which students each weekare asked to reflect on their “deliverable”for that week. “I change the word ‘as-signment’ to ‘deliverable’ because theword ‘deliverable’ puts the responsibilityon the students,” Legacy says.

Discussing the deliverables “teachesthem that there is always a reflection inwork.” It gives students a chance toanalyze what worked and what didn’t.

The goal of Legacy’s courses is to re-late the material to real-world situa-tions, which motivates students tolearn by emphasizing the things theywill need to know when they are in aparticular career. It also gets studentsto relate the material to their own livesand to seek other people’s perspec-tives.

For example, Legacy might includean “expert witness” in a course, some-one who works in a field that is rele-vant to the course. If it’s a law class,the expert witness might be an attor-ney. Legacy will have the students reada relevant chapter and follow up byasking the expert witness how the ma-terial relates to the real world or howhis or her experiences compare to whatthe students read in the textbook.

One of the keys to getting students totake an active role in their own learn-ing and their peers is a set of clearrubrics. For group projects, the rubricslist all the things students need to ac-complish, and for each group projectstudents assess each others’ participa-tion.

The rubrics remove the subjectivityof the grading process and give stu-dents the responsibility of selecting thegrade they want. For example, inthreaded discussions, students knowthat in order to get a C, they must re-


Active Online Learning PreparesStudents for the Workplace,Reflects Changing Learning StylePreferences

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spond with information that comesfrom the textbook. To get a B, theymust use information from the text-book and another resource. To get anA, they must respond with informationfrom the textbook and two other re-sources.

Like all learning situations, the suc-cess of active learning techniques de-pends largely on the dedication andskills of the individuals in the course.Legacy teaches at the undergraduateand graduate levels. Legacy’s graduatestudents, who are generally in the busi-ness world and understand the valueof active learning because it closely re-

sembles how they conduct themselvesat work, are more inclined than her un-dergraduates to “dive into” activelearning. However, the undergraduatesgenerally have less fear of the technol-ogy.

Contact Jane Legacy at [email protected]. @


Building relationships and communi-ties through peer collaboration in

online courses is a concern for manyinstructors, and finding a starting pointmight be a challenge. Fortunately, thereare instructors who have undergonethe processes.

Instructors within the University Sys-tem of Georgia participated in a studythat explored examples of peer collabo-ration exercises within their online uni-versity courses. The instructorsrepresented five universities and nineacademic disciplines. Their educationaland professional backgrounds variedgreatly. For most of the instructors, theonline courses in which they includedpeer collaboration were their first expe-riences teaching online, and most didnot receive formal training to do so,nor did they have access to teachingassistants during the various phases ofthe course. The instructors employed avariety of communication mechanismsand technology tools within thecourses involved in the study and theexamples of peer collaboration exer-cises offered by the instructors rangedfrom the simple to the complex.

The data provided by the instructors

revealed several instances of commonpractices and lessons learned, and a setof heuristics for successfully includingpeer collaboration in an online courseemerged.

1. Get rid of preconceptions—Priorto beginning the design of the on-line collaboration activities, aban-don any preconceptions regardingwhich types of exercises cannotoccur online.

2. Adapt and adopt existing collab-orative exercises—Rather thancreating new and original onlinepeer collaboration exercises fromthe beginning, exercises can be de-veloped initially by referencingprevious classroom collaborativeactivities that proved successfuland adapting those exercises foruse online.

3. Begin with a manageableamount of collaboration—To pro-vide optimal learning experiencesfor the students, incorporate a fewwell-planned exercises when firstincluding such activities.

4. Consider a course orientation—Though including a face-to-face

orientation for an online course isnot an option in some cases, aninitial session to introduce thecourse can be beneficial to the on-line student. If a face-to-facecourse orientation is not an op-tion, an initial course contentmodule can be designed to presentthat information.

5. Make the collaboration a statedcourse outcome—Encourage stu-dent efficacy with peer collabora-tion by first making collaborationa stated outcome of the course.Collaboration, participation, andcommunication expectations mustbe written into the syllabus.

6. Teach students how to collabo-rate—Provide students with infor-mation and tips on how to interactwith classmates, problem solve,constructively criticize, divide andassume responsibilities, organizetheir work, manage their time, andprovide an end product that isseamlessly representative of thecollaborative efforts of the group.

7. Provide structure for and requiredeliverables from the students—Help students manage time andmeet course milestones by requir-ing deliverables and informingthem of expected benchmark com-petencies.

8. Organize the student groupsearly and stabilize the groupsthroughout the course—Earlygroup formation allows the stu-dents to become familiar withtheir groupmates and conse-

17 Tips for SuccessfullyIncluding Peer Collaboration inan Online Course

By Teshia Young Roby, PhD

PAGE 24!

FROM PAGE 23

quently promotes ease of commu-nication within the groups. If pos-sible, groups should remain intactfor the duration of the course topromote team cohesion.

9. Create groups of three to five stu-dents—When groups containmore than five students, they be-come unmanageable. In largegroups, “lurkers” are able to notparticipate, “slackers” are able tounduly benefit, and “controllers”are able to dominate the dis-course. Groups of two may notfully allow the students learn theskills of group consensus gather-ing and problem solving.

10. Instruct groups to report largeproblems—During the peer col-laboration exercises, studentsshould be allowed—and ex-pected—to solve internal prob-lems. However, students shouldbe informed that irreconcilableproblems should be reported toallow an intervention to occurthat would enable project workto progress.

11. Provide feedback often—Prior totests and finals, students shouldreceive feedback on how wellthey understand the course infor-mation.

12. Carefully choose discussion top-ics—When preparing discussiontopics for the groups, choose in-teresting and controversial topicsto elicit discourse.

13. Prepare in advance for chatroom discussions—First, be or-ganized for chat room discus-sions. Make the chat room topicand any associated questionsavailable to the students at leastthree days prior to the exercise.Instruct the students to preparequestions and comments regard-ing the topic to help facilitate theflow of conversation during theexercise. Next, to promote stu-dent involvement and activity,give grades for sustentative par-

ticipation in the chat discussionand inform the students of thegrading structure prior to thechats.

14. Organize the discussion boardfor productive discourse—Be-cause of the volume of trafficthat the discussion board cangenerate, it is important to pro-vide a great deal of structure inthis area. First, create an exhaus-tive list of topics that might bediscussed during the course andcreate headings for each of thosetopics in the discussion area. In-struct the students to post mes-sages under the appropriate topicheading on the discussion boardand make the students aware ofthe rules and etiquette for post-ing a message to the discussionarea. Next, instruct the studentsto place questions for generalconsumption on the discussionboard and encourage other stu-dents to respond to the messageif they have an answer.

15. Constantly facilitate and moni-tor online collaboration—At notime during the course can thestudents be on autopilot. Sincephysical and verbal cues cannotbe obtained from the students,facilitation and monitoring of thecourse are the only ways to knowthat they understand the con-cepts that are being provided.During the peer collaboration ex-ercise, visit the discussion areasto make certain that the studentsremain on track with the con-cepts and on task with the as-signment.

16. Promote peer collaborationsthrough grading—When con-ducting group exercises that re-quire the use of the discussionboard, remind the students thatposted discussions are designedto replace the classroom discus-sions and that only substantivecontributions will be graded. Inaddition to the overall groupgrade for an exercise, be certain

to require the students to individ-ually submit their work to ensurethat everyone will have some-thing to contribute once thegroups meet. Conclude the exer-cise by having the students com-plete a group evaluation.

17. Receive student feedback oncollaboration exercises—In ad-dition to a general course evalua-tion, ask students for feedbackon each peer collaboration exer-cise, particularly those that arenewly implemented. Use thecomments received from the stu-dents to adjust, abandon, or con-firm the use of the exercises.

An Excerpt from:Roby, T. Y. (2002). An exploration ofperceived successful and unsuccessfulpeer collaboration exercises within on-line university courses. Department ofMiddle and Secondary Instruction andInstructional Technology. Unpublisheddoctoral dissertation, Georgia StateUniversity, Atlanta.

Teshia Young Roby is the educationaltechnology lead for the Academic andResearch Technologies Directive in Geor-gia Tech’s Office of Information Tech-nology. Contact her [email protected] @


FROM PAGE 23


Face-to-face instructors are increas-ingly turning to online communica-

tion tools to provide students theopportunities to discuss course contentwith peers. There are several commu-nication modes that support this typeof interaction, and in a recent study,Bill Warrick, education instructor atGeorge Mason University, and his col-league Stacy Connors surveyed a co-hort of graduate students in aninstructional technology master’s pro-gram on the quality of the learning ex-perience, peer interactions, and ease ofuse of email, bulletin board, and syn-chronous chat for collaborative groupwork.

The studyIn fall 2003, 49 students enrolled in

two courses—Teaching With Technol-ogy and Education and the Culture ofSchools—engaged in online discus-sions about seven books related to theculture of schools and technologytools. During the first five weeks, theyused email as their discussion tool, fol-lowed by Blackboard’s bulletin boardfeature in the second five-week period,and finally DigiChat software for syn-chronous communication in the finalfive-week period.

For each five-week discussion, thestudents were randomly divided intogroups of four or five and were askedto discuss the readings.

In the first five-week period, eachstudent was asked to create a chainemail message about what theythought was the main idea of the read-ing. Each message was to be sent tothe group one at a time in a specificorder. As each student received peers’messages he or she would comment

and forward the original message andall additional comments to the nextperson in the group. When the chainmessage made its way back to the orig-inal sender, he or she would read allthe comments and forward it to the in-structor.

For the Blackboard assignment, stu-dents were asked to post and reply toother group members’ comments aboutthe main ideas of the book.

In the synchronous part of thecourse, the instructor created privatechat rooms for each group to discussthe books. One student served as mod-erator and summarized the chat for theinstructor.

After each five-week period, Warricksurveyed the students to determinehow they rated

• their learning experiences usingeach of the three communicationmodes

• their interactions with peers usingeach of the three communicationmodes

• the ease of use of each of the threecommunication modes.

And at the end of the course, War-rick asked students to rank each com-munication mode in terms of overallquality.

ResultsBased on anonymous survey re-

sponses, the quality of the learning ex-periences, interactions with peers, andease of use were consistently highacross the three communicationmodes. In terms of quality of interac-tions with peers, synchronous chatrated slightly lower than the other two

modes.On a scale of 1 to 5 where 1 is the

best, the mean scores for each categorywere all 1’s and 2’s in terms of qualityof learning and peer interaction. “Thatkind of surprised and pleased us. Itsaid that all three were viable means ofinteraction,” Warrick says.

As for ranking the different commu-nication modes, there was no clear pre-ferred mode: 31 percent ranked emailas their preferred mode; 35 percentchose bulletin board; 33 percent chosesynchronous chat.

Students were less divided on whichcommunication mode they least pre-ferred: 29 percent rated email lowest;29 percent rated bulletin board lowest;41 percent ranked synchronous chatthe lowest.

“We just attributed that to the factthat one of the problems was that theywere doing this on a weekly basis, andit is difficult to arrange time for peopleto meet online, particularly when theyare just being introduced to the tool,”Warrick says.

Warrick and Connors also analyzedthe discussions that occurred in eachmode. “Blackboard and chat allowedfor a little more freedom of interaction.The email was a little too structured,and I wish we hadn’t had it as struc-tured as we had where they were onlyable to react once to someone’s com-ments. There was not a lot of opportu-nity for back and forth discussion, sowe didn’t see the depth of interactionsimply because of the way we had itstructured. In Blackboard and in thesynchronous chats, they were a lotmore free to react and have what weterm a ‘general discussion’ with a lotmore give and take,” Warrick says.

Implications“Inasmuch as we found that each of

the three was rated highly in terms oftheir quality of learning and interac-tion, we learned that it is appropriateto use any of these three tools depend-ing on the subject matter, time frame,

Comparing Online PeerInteraction Methods

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and students’ learning styles,” Warricksays.

In addition to the findings, informaldiscussions with students pointed outareas of frustration such as difficulty inorganizing synchronous chats and thelack of back-and-forth interaction usingemail.

Students reactions to these commu-nication tools were partly based ontheir previous experience with them,Warrick says. “Email was much morefamiliar to them. It facilitated their dis-cussion, and it made it easier for themto share their thoughts. By the sametoken, one of the problems we foundin talking with students after thecourse had ended was that they weresimply reacting to what someone wroteto them. If we had a more iterativeprocess where they could email backand forth among each of the five mem-bers a number of times, the quality ofthe discussion, I think, would ap-proach what we saw in Blackboard,”Warrick says.

Contact Bill Warrick at [email protected].

Collaborative learning is a processthat advances student learning in

the classroom. Collaboration occurswhen individual peers redefine them-selves as a group.

Groups enhance student learning.Through this learning process, studentsalso rediscover their own individualideas as they develop higher-level rea-soning skills and strategies.

Applying collaborative learning tech-niques in the online classroom pro-motes active student involvement inthe learning process. Collaboration alsocapitalizes on the work of the peergroup to improve understanding ofsubject matter and development ofwriting in the field of study.

Why collaborative groups?I include group activity as a means

to move students to a higher level ofthinking and responding to ideas in myEducational Philosophy and TeachingPractice online class. Through a meas-ure that I validated and modified called“The Educational Philosophy Test”(Jersin, 1972), online students deter-mine their personal educationalphilosophies. Students are grouped inone of two categories—traditionalist ormodernist—and then two subcate-gories are developed under each ofthese headings, resulting in four smallphilosophy groups.

These small philosophy groups pro-mote intellectual interaction amongtheir members, as students work tobetter understand difficult concepts.Because they are grouped by their per-sonal educational philosophies, peershave similar stances on the role of edu-cation. They support one another bysending drafts of papers for input be-

fore their final essays are due. Theyconnect online through virtual class-rooms or discussion threads to discussaspects of course material that provokethought and require in-depth review.Through use of small groups of likethinkers, the online participants estab-lish a bond, as group peers grapplewith readings that provoke thought,such as those of Plato Aristotle, Kant,and Dewey, among others.

Tips for developing smallgroups

The following are a few for incorpo-rating small groups into any onlineclass:• Establish a system of grouping that is

most favorable to your subject area.• Define what you mean as support.

Develop clear guidelines in whichgroup members support one another.

• Provide assignments that encourageactive group involvement.

• Open discussion threads in whichsmall groups can participate.

• Establish due dates that studentsmust meet so that they are preparedfor group discussion.

• Provide writing assignments that re-quire peer response and that furtherthe thinking process of each student.

Reference:Jersin, P. (1972). What is your educa-tion EP? The Clearing House 46, (5),274-278.

Patricia Smith is an assistant professorof English at Fitchburg State College inMassachusetts. Contact her [email protected]/ @

@


Developing Community Online

By Patricia A. Smith, EdD

FROM PAGE 25


Group work can be a hassle for stu-dents, particularly in the online

classroom, but the learning opportuni-ties it provides makes it a popular tech-nique among instructors. Tounderstand how adult learners work ingroups in online courses and to de-velop ways to make group work moreenjoyable and productive, Kathleen In-gram, assistant professor in the Univer-sity of South Alabama’s instructionaldesign and development program, sur-veyed and interviewed students in heronline graduate-level needs assessmentcourse. She found that the groups tookvery different approaches based ontheir schedules and preferences.

Group selectionIn the first week of the course, In-

gram conducted an introductorythreaded discussion to help build alearning community and to give stu-dents information about each otherwhen it came time to selecting a proj-ect and group.

Ingram posted project descriptions inthe second week and gave students achance to choose which project inter-ested them the most and who theywould like to work with. However, stu-dents did not have final say. Ingramalso considered each student’s amountof time in the program, instructionaldesign experience, cultural back-ground, technological experience withonline classes, and distance from cam-pus when she divided her 10 studentsinto three groups.

“With the asynchronous nature ofthe group work, it becomes very diffi-culty to make decisions. You have to becomfortable with each other, and youhave to have some strengths in [each

group]. So I tried to make the groupseven—to have some leadership andbackground in instructional design ineach,” Ingram says.

Different approachesOne of the first group activities was

to establish a charter, similar to what agroup in business and industry woulddo. Each group created a documentthat described how they were going towork together and how they weregoing to resolve problems.

As in most online courses, the stu-dents could use email, threaded discus-sions, chat, and/or face-to-facemeetings to work together (dependingon where they were located).

The three groups took quite differentapproaches. One group chose to usechat and developed a set of protocolsto avoid some of the problems that cancome up. For example, group membersagreed to use an ellipsis to indicate “Ihaven’t finished my thought, but Iwant you to read this while I type therest.” And a period indicated that aperson was done with a particularthought. Group members took turns asmoderator and timekeeper. “Theyturned out to be my best group, butalso had the most problems. One mem-ber was not on board, but the proto-cols allowed them to progress,” Ingramsays.

The chat protocols could have beenin the charter, but because the groupwas working in this environment forthe first time, they didn’t know exactlyhow they would use the tools andwhat issues might arise.

Another group was not completely ata distance, although they had moreoutside commitments than the other

groups and chose to do everything byemail. “I would say they got along bet-ter than the other groups. They wouldcome to consensus and then go for-ward with a plan, and if one of themwas having a bad week, the otherspicked up the slack with no questionsasked,” Ingram says.

The third group felt it was importantto meet face to face to establish rap-port. Since group members were local,they had the opportunity to meet sev-eral times. This group functioned theleast well because there was a personnew to the program and another whowas not doing his share of the work.“Because most of the communicationwas asynchronous, it was hard to holdthat person accountable,” Ingram says.

Although all of the groups were fa-miliar with threaded discussion (In-gram used it throughout the course),none of them chose it for their groupcommunication. Ingram speculates thatthe two groups chose email becausethey were more familiar with it and be-cause its’ more of a “push” than “pull”technology—“you don’t have to go intothe course. It comes to you,” Ingramsays.

The group that used chat, chose itbecause they didn’t want the commu-nication to drag out over the week, In-gram speculates.

“[The choice of communicationtools] depends on the content andwhat the learners are trying to accom-plish. Since they were trying to cometo consensus and move this projectalong, that’s why they chose chat andemail. They are much more dynamicthan threaded discussion. Threadeddiscussions are rather static and can re-ally take longer because students arenot as accountable. They can come inat the last minute, but if they’re notthere at the chat at the scheduled time,they’ve missed it,” Ingram says.

Lessons learnedThis was the first time Ingram used

charters to establish group practices,

Let Students Choose How toCollaborate

PAGE 28!

and she found they didn’t make muchdifference. [Students] actually madetheir decisions as problems came upand the projects evolved,” Ingram says.“I would definitely use a charter andhave them try to decide ahead of timehow they were going to work but makeit more of a living document. Ratherthan writing it for me, I would havethem write it for themselves, and afterthe first couple of weeks come in andchange it the way they need to.”

Ingram wanted to give her studentsthe chance to decide for themselveshow they would work. While she stillbelieves that is an important aspect ofadult learning, she would create somecheckpoints along the way so she canobserve their communication to makesure things are going well and perhapsask questions or offer guidance.

Contact Kathleen Ingram at [email protected].

Many students fear group work,and the prospect of working with

classmates at a distance adds more un-certainty and apprehension. Neverthe-less, group work in the onlineclassroom can encourage active partici-pation and teach the same groupprocesses that many will encounter inthe workplace. The following is howone online instructor uses group workin her courses.

Cynthia Calongne, computer scienceprofessor at Colorado Technical Univer-sity, uses activity-based instruction inher courses whether they are on cam-pus, hybrid, or fully online. She doesthis to keep the courses consistent sothat students can take them in anymedium and get the same instructionand because computer science lends it-self well this approach. “I’m a big be-liever in groups because it models theway we do work in the software indus-try. Very few individuals write an en-tire product by themselves,” Calongnesays.

In each group project in Calongne’sonline courses, whether it’s developingrequirements specs or designing soft-ware or user interfaces, students haveto elicit and define project require-ments as a group. And in her graduatecourses students have to form groupsand develop and complete their proj-ects in just five-and-a-half weeks.

Group selection and formationShe begins the group process by cre-

ating a forum in which students intro-duce themselves, post and discusstopic ideas, and select teams.

Calongne lets students select theirown teams of three to five. She triedassigning students to teams once, butthat didn’t work very well. “Everyonein the class I had had at least once in

the campus classroom so I had an un-derstanding of their preferences, goals,and why they had taken the class. Iformed teams based on my knowledgeof their backgrounds. It was disastrous.It took more work on my part to keepthem motivated and going in the rightdirection,” she says.

Along the same lines, Calongne al-lows groups to develop their own waysof working together. “I have seen sometry to get together for face-to-facemeetings because they feel discon-nected. I’ve seen others mobilizequickly and divide the project into sec-tions. Some are highly motivated andcan work independently and gather on-line every few days. And some spendtheir initial time in threaded discus-sions and won’t produce tangible re-sults immediately.

“I allow them two weeks to exploreand then ask them to show me some oftheir sections so I can give feedback. Ithink that’s critical regardless of whichmethod they use. I’ll confirm whatthey’re doing so they’re comfortablebecause when there’s a lot of uncer-tainty, the team has a hard time mak-ing confident progress. They’ll spendmore time worrying than actually get-ting the work done,” Calongne says.

The group struggleAlthough Calongne provides some

structure—she gives the groups a tem-plate that has all the possible sectionsthat could be included in the project,and each group decides which sectionsto include—she deliberately allows forambiguity, creating an environmentwhere conflict is inevitable.

While online instructors in generalshould provide feedback within 24

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Online Process-Oriented GroupProjects

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hours for most classroom activities, Ca-longne makes an exception for teamprojects to allow students to learn fromtheir mistakes. She monitors groupprogress throughout her courses, butprovides feedback only when studentsask for it or if she sees that they aregetting off course.

“Each group needs to struggle,” Ca-longne says. “It’s difficult to know howlong they should be allowed to strug-gle, but you let them struggle for awhile, and then you give them three orfour recommendations so they canmake a choice as to how to proceed.That’s important, otherwise studentswon’t have a good team experience;they won’t see the benefits of [teamwork]; and they won’t be successful inthe course.”

Informal communicationThroughout the group projects, Ca-

longne encourages her students to takerisks and to not concentrate on polish-ing their communication within thegroup. “So often there’s a communityof people who are uncomfortable com-mitting their thoughts to words and

having them in print. They think every-thing has to be precise like an exam re-sponse or research. I try not to be veryformal with them so they don’t spendso much time on reflection so that theiranswer no longer sounds like theirs.”

In addition, Calongne does not havethe groups submit incremental deliver-ables on the projects “because that justcreates busy work. Why polish some-thing that’s wrong? Instead, I tell themthat I’m reading all their stuff and thattheir classmates are reading all theirstuff, which improves quality.”

Calongne holds optional weekly chatsessions. Each session lasts one hourand is loosely structured. It’s an oppor-tunity for the students to review forexams and to ask questions about thegroup projects. Although the main goalof the group projects is to learn theprocess of working with others, Ca-longne notes that in these sessions stu-dents are often more focused on theproduct than the process, asking forclarifications of grading rubrics.

In cases where groups lose members(whether by dropping the course orswitching to another group) studentsare often concerned with how it willaffect the quality of the project. It isn’t

until the end of the course when stu-dents take time to reflect on the groupprojects that their learning about theprocess becomes apparent.

EvaluationCalongne uses several assessment

tools. She has students evaluate eachother by asking whether each teammember performed. If all the teammembers agree that one member didnot perform, that student does not re-ceive credit for the project.

She also has objective measure-ments, including the number of timeseach student entered the course site,the quality of the posts, and the inter-action within teams.

To assess other elements of thecourse that are not addressed by thesemeasures, Calongne gives studentsbonus points for a three- to five-pageemail telling her what they learned andwhy it was significant. In this emailstudents often indicate what theylearned about the team experience, andshe uses this information to refine hercourses.

Contact Cynthia Calongne at [email protected]. @

As a former online learner, ValerieTaylor, an online instructor at De

Anza Community College in California,understands the needs and frustrationsof her online students and the impor-tance of interaction and collaborationto motivate and improve learning out-comes.

Even though she was enrolled in aprogram in online teaching and learn-ing at California State University-Hay-

ward, Taylor herself was hesitant totake an online course. “At the outset ofthe program, a couple of people I knewhad enjoyed an online course they hadtaken. I thought, ‘I’m not sure. I’m apeople person, and I’m not sure I wantto do this sitting at home by myself,’”Taylor says.

Within a few days, she was con-vinced of the effectiveness of the on-line format. “What was interesting to

me was the sense of community thatwas actively promoted. I felt I knewmore of my classmates better becauseof the introductions and discussionsthan I would have sitting in a class-room that I would have had to drive anhour to and an hour from after a longday of work,” Taylor says.

For Taylor, the essence of the pro-gram (which used eCollege for her firsttwo quarters and switched to Black-board) was the threaded discussions—in both contributing to the discussionand being able to read what other peo-ple wrote. “It’s imperative to be ableto collect threads you previously readand be able to string them togethereasily. I don’t know how one wouldhave done it if the discussion tool was

How a Former Student/CurrentInstructor Facilitates OnlineStudent Collaboration

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FROM PAGE 28


any less capable in that department,”Taylor says.

While she missed some of the per-sonal contact with her classmates,being able to peruse the threaded dis-cussions at her leisure meant that shewouldn’t miss a thing, “which is huge,especially when you have a class of 30or 40 other teaching professionals whohave lots of things to say,” Taylor says.

In addition to the threaded discus-sions, collaborating on group projectsenabled her and her fellow learners toshare their areas of expertise with eachother. For example, Taylor worked withthree other students on a project to de-velop a WebQuest on insects for a K-12teacher in the group. A kindergartenteacher provided the subject-matter ex-pertise. Taylor had more of a Webbackground than the others. And twoother group members helped withrollovers, animation, links, and insectpictures.

“We did this iteratively, each of uscontributing our piece, which workedreally well. We identified the roles andresponsibilities, the tasks, and howthey would be shared. And we did it allthrough discussion threads. Being ableto have that record of the process wasvery helpful,” Taylor says.

The value of her collaborative experi-ences convinced Taylor to include simi-lar elements in the course she teaches(in the CSU-Hayward program andthrough De Anza Community College).“Students say they hate group projects.They don’t want anything to do withthem. All of the students in the CSU-Hayward program said the same. Butwe make them do them, and they alllove it. They do really well,” Taylorsays.

In a recent JavaScript course, someof Taylor’s local students got togetherphysically to work on group projects.Some talked on the phone, and someused email. She found that the groupsthat collaborated online struggled morein the beginning, “but, I think, in theend, they had a better understanding

of what they were doing, and every-body participated more equitably.”

When she first started teaching on-line, she created private discussionareas for each group (and gave herselfaccess so she could monitor the inter-action). She has since made all thegroups open to the entire class in caseher students are curious about whatthe other groups are working on andhow they are working together and incase a student would like to changegroups.

Taylor monitors the groups and occa-sionally sends emails to group mem-bers when a member is excluded ordoes not participate as much as theothers. Taylor looks for potential prob-lems but does not respond unless herinput is needed. Because most of herstudents are non-traditional, they oftenbring project-management skills to thegroup that help resolve group issues,and the students will often resolveproblems on their own. “I’m aston-ished how self-correcting groups canbe,” she says.

Including group work in an onlinecourse is also a good way of tailoringthe course to each student’s interests.For example, in the courses Taylor tookat CSU-Hayward, there were corporatetrainers, K-12 teachers, and higher edu-cation instructors — all of whom haddifferent things they wanted to get outof the program. Because the courseswere online, it was easier for the in-structors to offer students morechoices about how they learned, andthe students could take a more ac-tive role in directing their learning,which increases their engagementin the course.

Contact Valerie Taylor at [email protected]. @

FROM PAGE 29

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