Assessing Collaborative Efforts (original post 10/14/09)

Each student should be assessed only on his or her contribution to the group project. Roles need to be assigned and specific rubrics constructed to assess the student’s mastery of the learning objective. Under no circumstances should a student receive a group grade on a project, as the failure of a student to complete work should not determine another student’s score. Aside from a group project, each student needs to have the minimum accepted criteria for participation in online discussions and postings.

Some Guidelines for Collaboration

· The quality of the posting needs to be monitored by the instructor and a grade associated with a rubric.

· Because some students have differing levels of skills, the rubric gives specific guidelines and allows some flexibility for the student.

· Rubrics need to be posted for the student to review prior to the assignment.

· Instructors need to be active, timely, and clear with their feedback. If an issue arises with a student’s lack of understanding, the instructor can contact them privately.

I can personally connect with the student who does not want to collaborate on a group project. For whatever reason, a student may be reluctant or refuse to complete a group project. To address the student’s concerns I would first allow students to select their own members of the group. By doing this, I would give some control to the reluctant student which may help to mitigate some of his or her concerns. Secondly, teams would not be assigned randomly—I cannot emphasize this enough! Teams or learning communities should be constructed using meaningful and consistent criteria. At the beginning of the course I would have students complete a survey to identify their needs and work behaviors. After which I would create groups that partner like minded students which could reduce some of the conflicts normally associated with random groups.

For learning communities the instructor needs to communicate the specific requirements and expectations for all students. Once the expectations are outlined in the syllabus the learner has the choice to either complete the requirements of the learning community or not. The instructor monitors interactions within the learning community and guides discussion if the information being discussed is incorrect—otherwise, the instructor is a moderator with an active presence.

Reference

Durrington, V., Berryhill, A., & Swafford, J. (2006). Strategies for enhancing student interactivity in an online environment. College Teaching, 54(1), 190-193.