Group Work Strategies Guide

Create rich tasks for your groups

Tasks being discussed in group work settings should be ones that are compelling, challenging, and also have various pathways for students to explore. The tasks should be pretty difficult for one student to complete or figure out on their own.

Keep in mind some of your more introverted students

Try to pair students you know have a difficult time contributing to group discussion with peers who they connect with or feel more at ease with.

Assign roles in a group

Depending on what the task is. Defining roles within the group, or having students define roles, can be very helpful to all involved. It can help students who are more introverted know and understand their role, it can also help students who tend to control the conversation also have a defined space.

One sheet of paper

Give the entire group one sheet of paper with the problem, or discussion prompt. The students need to work on this paper together so that one student does not spend time working and finishing the problem on their own.

Google Docs can be an easy way for students

Random role assigners

• Random Team Generator
• Wheel of names

Rubrics generators

• Rubistar
• Pre-created rubrics

Collaborative discussion tools

• Google Slides
• Google Docs
• Microsoft Whiteboard
• Padlet

Think-pair-share or Think-write-pair/share

The instructor asks a discussion question. Students are instructed to think or write about an answer to the question before turning to a peer to discuss their responses. Groups then share their responses with the class.

Peer instruction

The question is posed and students think about their answer and vote on a response before turning to a neighbor to discuss. Students can change their answers after discussion, and “sharing” is accomplished by the instructor revealing the graph of student responses and using this as a stimulus for large class discussion.

*This would be a great activity to use a collaborative learning tool such as Google Docs.

Jigsaw

In this approach, groups of students work in a team of four to become experts on one segment of new material, while other “expert teams” in the class work on other segments of new material. 

The class then rearranges, forming new groups that have one member from each expert team. The members of the new team then take turns teaching each other the material on which they are experts.

Buzz groups

Pick a challenging issue or problem, and then ask students to form small groups to discuss it. After approximately 5-10 minutes of discussion, call on a few of the groups to report their answers. Ask the other groups whether they agree with the reported answers by a show of hands.

Speed interviews

The goal of this group activity is for the students to gather as many opinions as possible about an issue.  

• First, divide the class into pairs and distribute a series of questions for them to discuss (one to three questions are recommended). 
• Have the students switch partners every 2 minutes or so and ask the same questions to their new partner.  
• Switch groups as many times as appropriate and then have the entire class report back and discuss the results.

Starter wrapper technique

• One student acts as the starter, the other as a wrapper.
• The starter starts the discussion:
• Opens the discussion, poses problems in the text, and posts contributions that peers can build on. Can provide clarification if there is a misunderstanding.
• The wrapper summarizes (Synthesizer):
• Integrated the ideas and concludes the discussion by highlighting new ideas that were introduced in the discussion.
• If you have a large enough class this technique works well when you have discussion moderators to:
• Monitor the discussion, ask for more participation and encourage discussion of posted comments.
• All others are participants post to the discussion board: 
• It is a good idea to give students parameters for what you expect out of a discussion post. For example: participants must post one original post of 300 - 500 words and two replies - no minimum but no general statements
• You can also create a discussion schedule and post it to Canvas along with a role schedule so students know what their role in the discussion will be.
• Roles can rotate each discussion board or as often as you like.

Video discussions

• Have students record a video of themselves with the topic you are discussing for the week. 
• Have other students watch the video and comment on the videos and provide constructive feedback. 
  • You can easily use TC Digital Media for video commenting in Canvas.

Hot seat discussions

• Divide your class (or let them choose) into small groups and assign each group (or let them choose) a topic, issue, or theme.
• Groups will research the assigned topic and summarize it for their discussion board. 
• Allow groups to think of various questions for other students to answer.
• Students in that group become facilitators for that week

Structured debate

• Divide your class (or let them choose) into small groups and assign each group (or let them choose) a topic, issue, or theme.
• Groups will research the assigned topic and summarize it for their discussion board. 
• Allow groups to think of various questions for other students to answer.
• Students in that group become facilitators for that week

Facilitators Role:

• Monitor the discussion board
• Only chime in if the teams are not answering challenging questions.
• After a set amount of time summarize the “best of” and declare a winner (if you decide to).

Agree or disagree discussion

• Students select their position on a topic and provide examples and evidence to support their stance.
• Students respond to at least two other students of the opposing stance and provide a challenging question for their opponent to answer.
• Students write a final post on whether they would change their position or not based on the week's discussions.

Storyboarding discussions

• Provide students with various parts of a story at various times.
• Each part of your story is a new discussion
• Students will draft responses to the various questions released with the new storyline.

Self-guided learning courses

Linkedin Learning has a plethora of eLearning courses that you can use to supplement your course. Students can take a self-paced Linkedin Learning course and earn a certificate in new software, creative writing strategy, and much more.

• Sign in to LinkedIn Learning with your TC email

Rubrics

Rubrics are a fantastic way to grade group assignments. A Rubric gives students exact direction on what they need to do or turn in to achieve the grade they would like.

• You can easily add your rubric to your Canvas course to embed in your assignments.

Self-assessment

Have students assess themselves. Ask them to give themselves a grade and explain why they deserve that grade.

Peer evaluations

If students are working in a group on a project it can often be beneficial to have students evaluate their group members. This can be done on a scale system, through a rubric, or simply by having them submit feedback on their experience.

Not all work needs a grade

Not all group work needs to be graded. Many find sufficient activities throughout the semester to grade students individually. If you would like to give students a group work grade, think about making it a participation grade or provide a rubric for grading.