Exploring Group Projects
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This article explores the use of group projects in online learning. |
Table of Contents
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What Are Group Projects?
A group project is an activity involving two or more students working together on a common deliverable or set of deliverables, often over a period of time.
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Because group work tends to have much at stake for students--a greater involvement of time and effort and, typically, a larger portion of one’s overall grade--you will want to invest a fair amount of time to plan the project well. Based on the results of their study involving collaborative work in online graduate courses, Brindley, Walti, and Blaschke (2009) recommend considering these seven elements:
Facilitate learner readiness for group work and provide scaffolding to build skills.
Establish a health balance between structure (clarity of task) and learner autonomy (flexibility of task).
Nurture the establishment of learner relationships and sense of community.
Monitor group activities actively and closely.
Make the group task relevant for the learner.
Choose tasks that are best performed by a group.
Provide sufficient time.
Designing for Group Projects
The following suggestions from Johnson and Miles (2004) will help you design an effective team project:
Design the group project to accomplish something that cannot be done, or cannot be done as well, by individuals alone.
Design authentic assessment of course objectives and competencies utilizing group work as the primary method to build community. (We’ll explore community in the 5.3 section).
Design a group project that clearly explains the goals, process, and expected outcomes of collaboration and clearly defines evaluation criteria to be used.
PLEASE GO: Take a few moments to go through Johnson and Miles’ slide presentation, prepared for the 2004 TELECOOP conference, that provides specifics on their suggestions:
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Students must access the Groups link on the course site under the content section, and sign up for a group based upon the first letter of his/her last name. These groups will also be used to determine the due date for projects as found in the schedule in this syllabus.
Group | Letters of Students’ Last Names |
| Group | Letters of Students’ Last Names |
1 | A-B |
| 5 | M |
2 | C-E |
| 6 | N-R |
3 | F-H |
| 7 | S-T |
4 | I-L |
| 8 | U-Z |
Whether you plan to participate in Zoom sessions (live sessions using a microphone/headset combination), or in Discussion Boards, you need to join a group. You will note that the groups were selected based upon the first letter of your last name as it is listed in the user's portion of the site. Groups are listed in the syllabus. Please make sure that you enroll yourself in one of these groups during the first week of class so that your participation points can be counted. These groups are also used to determine which week your project is due (by Saturday at 11:59 p.m. Mountain time of that week).
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Date due: Reply post - Wednesday 11 PM Mountain
The Case Study 1 document is available in Lesson 3 and contains scenarios from Chapters 8, 9, and 10.
Click Groups from the main course menu.
Select your Case Study 1 Group Assignment.
Click Group Discussion Board.
Select the Case Study 1 Discussion Board forum for your group.
Click Create Thread and enter your name as the subject of the thread.
In the Message text entry box, answer the questions that are associated with your scenario.
Click Submit to create the new thread.
Your initial post on your scenario is due Sunday, 11:59 p.m. Mountain Time.
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