Engaging Groupwork: Strategies for Meaningful Activities

Here are notes from Engaging Groupwork: Strategies for Meaningful Activities, a workshop held on PED Day at Dawson College on October 14, 2022. It was co-led by Cory Legassic from Saltise and Jeff from WID. The following notes were written by Cory and sent to participants after the workshop:

One of the bigger distinctions in our discussion was between low stakes vs. higher stakes group work. Low stakes is usually in-class group group activities whereas high stakes is group projects that involve and necessitate scaffolding.

A FEW KEY CONVERSATIONS:

Creating a culture of group work: Just like big assignments and projects benefit from scaffolding, group work benefits from it as well. We can rehearse throughout the semester the responsibilities and skills they will need for the group work. Offer workshops and handouts on good group principles. (Create it with them. Ask them to create the norms and rules of group work.)

Equality vs equity: Does everyone have to do the same work? Or can the group take on different responsibilities and facilitate the fairness. (I.e., does everyone have to present for the same amount of time in a oral presentation, or could someone do more work on handouts and the other visual aides)

Online collaborative tools: Try using collaborative note-taking and tools like google slides for students to collaborate online outside of class, where teachers can check in and coach.

Responsibilities and roles: Identify the responsibilities that are pillars to good group work: effective communication, clear (S.M.A.R.T.) objectives that translate into clear timelines. These responsibilities can crystallize into the roles of facilitator, note-taker, time manager, etc. And these roles can rotate.

Ongoing reflection: Getting groups to reflect on the process of group work. Using archetypes like “Coping with Couch Potatoes and Hitchhikers” allows students to acknowledge group dynamic obstacles and establish strategies early on with the teacher on how to manage themselves.

Here are some of the resources from the workshop:

• Click here for the Slides from the workshop.
• Click here for the reading on “Coping with Couch Potatoes and Hitchhikers”: great for discussing common group dynamics and obstacles. Students can brainstorm how to respond to these situations before they happen.
• Click here for a ton of great improv warm-ups you can try in the classroom.
• Click here for the SALTISE website with many great Active Learning activities.

For further reading:

• Facilitating Group Learning, by George Lakey
• Click here for a chapter on “Managing Group Work” from A Guide to Teaching in the Active Learning Classroom.
• Click here for a PDF of Jame’s Langs chapter on “Teaching with Small Groups” in On Course: A Week by Week Guide to Your First Semester of College Teaching