Boise State University Boise State University
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CTL Teaching Gallery The Center for Teaching and Learning
2018
Effective and Interactive Group Assignments in an Online Course Effective and Interactive Group Assignments in an Online Course
Teresa Focarile
Boise State University
Lana Grover
Boise State University
Kuh, G . D.
O'Donnell
,
K.
(20
13). Ensuring Quality& Taking Hi
gh
-Impact
Practices
to Scale. AAC&U.
McTighe,
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Wiggins,
G.
(2013). Essential Questions. Association for Supervision Curriculum De-
velopment.
Papert,
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Hare!,
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(1991).
"Situating
Constructionism".
In
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el,
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Papert,
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(E
ds.), Construction-
ism.
Ablex.
Patton,
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(2014).
User
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Schwaber,
K.
Sutherland, J.
(201
7). The
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e, Novem her
2017
edition. ScrumGuides.org.
Swales,
J.M.
(1990). Genre Analysis: English in Academic
and
Research
Settings.
Cambridge
University
Press.
Paul
Gestwicki,
Ball State
University
Effective
and
Interactive
Group
Assignments
in
an
Online
Course
Two years ago I [Teresa] redesigned
my
Theatre History course from a face to face
format to
an
online class. While the content and assessments translated well to the on-
line environment, I had trouble replicating the kind
of
interactive group
work
that I had
done
in
the face to face course. Not surprisingly, the one comment I repeatedly got from
students was that they wished the course allowed th
em
more opportunities to interact
with
each
other.
To
address this issue, I partnered with our Instructional Designer over mobile tech-
nology
to
find ways to leverage technology to support more collaborative online group
projects. The solution we landed on was to use
our
uni
ve
rsit
y's
Google suite
to
provide
an online, collaborative space in which the students could work, and then bring their
final
work
back to our LMS.
Based
on
that approach, I re-designed the course to include 5 group assigmnents.
These assignments occur every two
to
three weeks.
While
each assignment is different,
in
th
at
we
are studying different periods
of
theatre history, they
all
follow this basic
framework:
1.
I randomly create groups
of
3 students
(each
time the groups are different).
2. I create a Google folder for each group and
make
it available for all the students
in
the group to view and edit.
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High-Impact
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3. I assign a problem for the group to solve (using
what
they learned from that
week's
reading
and
additional
research), and create a Google Doc, with a
prompt
, for
each
group
to write their answer to
the
problem
.
4. Each student within
the
group is expected to
do
research that will support their
collective answer. Research assets are shared
in
the group folder where all members can
review
and
analyze the results.
5. After a collaborative commenting process, students create one final answer.
Each
group submits their answer
to
the problem using
our
LMS
discussion board, and
each
student then must read and respond to two different groups' posts.
For
example, in the third
week
of
the
course, in which
we
studied the theatre
of
Ancient Greece,
the
students
read
two
plays, Lysistrata and Oedipus Rex.
Each
student
was responsible for finding a
review
of
a production
of
each
play, looking for reasons the
producing company chose
that
play to perform. Then,
as
a
group,
they considered
and
answered the following question:
Your
group will imagine that you are members
of
a theatre company that are charged
with deciding which play
your
company will perform next.
You
must choose which
of
these two plays
you
should produce, and then write a statement to
your
theatre
company about the reasons for your choice.
Your
statement should include one reason
based on the research done by
your
group
of
other productions
of
the play, and one
reason based on what we learned about why this play was originally performed (from
our historical reading during this module).
By using a Google
Doc
for their collaborative work,
my
online students can asyn-
chronously post their research and comment
on
others' work in their
own
time. Com-
ments stay live within the document, updating regularly, and are automatically shared
with members
of
the group.
In
this way, the student group can polish their answer col-
laboratively before submitting the final version to
our
LMS
discussion board.
In addition
to
creating
the
collabor
ative space
for
students, the
Google
folders also
have additional benefits, including:
• & Having students
work
in a Google Doc allows me to track interactions
on
their
written work, to s
ee
who
participated in the discussions/editing, and to review
what
changes they made to
their
work along the way.
• & The shared folder
for
each
group makes it easy for
me
to grade
the
assignment,
as all pieces are
in
one place.
• &
The
folders also help me to easily collect artifacts
of
students' work for overall
assessment
of
student performance
in
our
department.
• & Google folders grant students continued access, allowing
them
to more easily
use materials from the course for future portfolios.
Shared
Tips
for
Effective
Teaching
I
43
Not only were there benefits for me
as
the instructor in creating these group as-
signments, but the students found them useful as well. When asked to reflect on which
assignments during the semester most helped them achieve one
of
our Course Learning
Outcomes, multiple students referenced the group projects as work that helped them
learn in the course. One student wrote,
"T
he group [projects] were helpful in [achieving
the Leaming Outcome
of
'form and defend your own aesthetic judgments orally and
in
writing'] because I could get feedback on a particular costume or set design and then
defend my ideas ... I
wo
uld often get feedback from classmates that really opened my
perspective"
(I. Berenson, Unit IV exam, 2017).
Teresa Focarile, Boise State University
Lana Grover, Boise State University
The
Promise
and
Challenge
of
Synchronous
Online
Cooperative
Learning
The current standard paradigm for online learning involves asynchronous learn-
ing.
We
propose to expand that paradigm
to
include synchronous elements to the gen-
eral course design, specifically cooperative learning (CL). Cooperative learning in any
classroom, traditional or online, must include a synchronous event: all members are
present at the same time in the same space. A synchronous form
of
online CL simulates
face-to-face interaction available in a live classroom but conducted through screen-to-
screen communication. The inclusion
of
synchronous components carries the benefit
of
increased student engagement and community-building, thereby maximizing the poten-
tial for student learning and successful completion.
The rationale for synchronous online CL is based on the powerful body
of
class-
room CL research results summarized in Davidson, Major, and Michaelsen
(2
014).
These include academic achievement, higher order thinking skills, interpersonal skills,
intergroup relations, and more.
We
predict that the benefits
of
CL will transfer from the
synchronous classroom environment to the synchronous online
environment,
but not
necessarily
to
an asynchronous online environment.
Proposed synchronous course components would include meetings
of
all students
eruolled
in
the course with the instructor. The compatibility
of
time zones in which
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for
Me
with
High-Impact
Practices
