Distance Learning Group Work

Enriching and Challenging

      Group work is not an easy thing in the regular classroom! Instructors carefully form the groups thinking about participants’ skills, personalities, experience and motivation levels. Despite the things that can and do go wrong in the interplay, working with other people on a project that needs every member’s contribution is very worthwhile. It replicates “real world” workplace frustrations and frictions as well as the benefits of coming at a goal from different perspectives and cultures/worldviews. It is the way all projects develop ---- bumpily and with glitches.

I anticipate similar scenarios with the DL group activities I would hope to organize.

     Our current participants are all very busy but quite highly motivated to “get the job done”. It seems to me that we are all intrinsically motivated to find out more about the possibilities of cutting edge distance learning development.  But some did not realize all the ways that interaction would be required since we all have previously done online courses asynchronously with no necessity to be involved online with other participants. Most of my previous experience in a blended learning course using technology has been to meet with the instructors and participants for a day of training each month over six months. The online part was individualized, asynchronous, with products uploaded for predetermined deadlines.

     For this course, Teaching Languages Online, it was difficult to send out the first invite email as some had not gotten or maybe had not given out their gmail account address. So sending/inviting was guess work. Then people may have received the email but were not checking that account as they were unaware of the need for communication in regards to the course.

     At the first meeting the goals were misunderstood. I think I would have preferred to add an initial Hangout meeting at the front end of the course where the goal would be only to get in Hangouts  and for all participants to do a simple icebreaker conversation. That would help people to be more comfortable with their group mates before needing to get down to the business of producing a product as the result of getting together. I will look at developing a scavenger hunt – like activity that will feature exploring what Hangout can do.

     There is also the uneasiness that many people feel about making oneself known globally. Many participants do not have their actual picture posted so they will also be resistant to using the web cam in a Hangout. I think this then makes those who figured that they needed to be open about their identity in the class context almost feel foolish for allowing their face to be seen.

     I think that I will ask Hangout participants to find an image to use and make it clear that it should not be their own face. They could use an object or maybe initials or a representation from art for example. This could be the basis of the first Hangout --- explaining why I chose that image.

     Spanning several time zones and also different work and weekend days is also something to consider. Some people expect to meet on the weekend but others protect that time from any type of work. Finding out those preferences is not automatic as different cultures have different communication styles --- there is the gamut --- from blunt and direct to gracious and accommodating words of a culture that must not tell the constraints on their time because that would be deemed rude!

     You also have people who need lots of lead time to work on their part of the assignment and those who pull off a great product just in the nick of time. That can be nerve-racking on both sides.

Our group experienced confusion when one diligent person filled in the assignment because they saw the approaching deadline and seemingly no hope of collaborating. Then the Hangout did occur and a totally different activity was jointly planned. But the diligent person forgot to explain that the form was already filled in with a different activity! After a couple days that was clarified and sorted out.

Meanwhile as it is not easy to “Hangout” the group members did their best to contribute the portions agreed to/assigned. If you look at our activity you will realize that we did communicate but not enough to actually sync all our thoughts and interpretations of assessing what will be evident in students for that particular mode of communication.

     With many online experiences squished into a month of learning, our course may be somewhat more condensed and varied than courses we will design and facilitate. Some of our group members are just now finding how to negotiate the logistics of meeting in time for our last Hangout.

     I will make a rubric for the assigned group work. There will be two parts ---- group dynamic/process and then the actual product/each person’s contribution.

     Each team member will need to fill out an evaluation form on their participation and then one on each of the other participants. These will be sent privately to the course facilitator. It will include areas such as time spent, cooperation, effort, contribution to discussions around the project, and attendance as expected virtual meetings.

     I will also use the following list to design the process side of the rubric:

• regular meeting attendance
• equity of contribution
• evidence of cooperative behaviour
• appropriate time and task management
• application of creative problem solving
• use of a range of working methods
• appropriate level of engagement with task
• development of professional competencies
• evidence of capacity to listen
• responsiveness to feedback/criticism.

http://www.cshe.unimelb.edu.au/assessinglearning/03/group.html

     There are many excellent rubrics online for the various online products/software use. So I will tweak one of those for the particular group project.