Collaborative Learning Groups: Concepts & Tools

Group formation, size, membership and heterogeneity

The most common methods of group formation are random, by tutor allocation, and self-selection. Learning groups usually have about four people to ensure there are enough people for a diversity of views and skills, and to share the work, but not too many to make meeting times and the meetings themselves unwieldy.

There are a number of things to consider if choosing the group rather than being allocated.

Heterogeneity Groups need sufficient heterogeneity to ensure a variety of viewpoints and contributions, to encourage mutual challenging of unshared presuppositions and biases, and because heterogeneous groups are generally better and more creative at problem-solving.

Friends are for fun; are they for work? It can be tempting to stay with friends or acquaintances, and while this is helpful for some groups, others later encounter problems in terms of forming a working rather than a primarily social relationship.

Choosing by topic Many students who use the topic rather than friendship to form groups, or are randomly grouped, come to value their differences and enjoy working with and learning from people they would not normally have mixed with.

In most situations, the course coordinator will decide how groups are to be formed and there are clearly benefits and costs associated with each method. When you do have a choice, it will serve you well to remember the advantages of moving beyond a purely friendship association.
Choose on the basis of topic interest, the strengths inherent in the combination of skills and knowledge each brings to the group, the personal ‘baggage’ each brings to the group (some good; some not so good), and to get a diversity of approaches. When you have a choice, canvass the other groups/topics that are forming and consider carefully your best options.

I felt some connections with the tutorial group, that I'm not feeling even this year, I really enjoyed the different people. If we hadn't have done it, this would never have eventuated. It's easy to just go to a group that you know, our group didn't have much in common but that was the best part of it.

Now I've had experience with three groups, all were wide ranging, The BEST aspect of it is working with a variety of people who I would not interact with otherwise.

Group building

It is important to lay the foundation of interpersonal understanding and communication from which the group can create and achieve its academic goals. To aid initial group building, a series of four exercises have been designed to help the group to discuss members' aims and goals; and to introduce reflective praxis. The exercises are contained in Appendix 4.

Collaborative writing

There are several methods of producing a final written product as a group. However the group decides to approach the task of writing up the project, groups are well advised to start writing from the beginning, in the form of collections of notes or points, or summaries to date, as these will form an invaluable basis for more formal drafts.

The following examples are suggestions only, to be mixed and matched as suits the group's skills, preferences and resources.

The group discusses the basic format and suggestions for its development; one person does the initial planning.
Several writers pool notes they have collected and share them to form a preliminary draft.
The group discusses and generates an overall structure of the report in terms of particular sections and some suggestions for each section.
The group divides the work into sections and each writes one part. This will need re-working as a whole draft to achieve consistency in tone, format, point of view and overall flow, either by one, some or all members.
Group members rotate the roles of drafter, reviewer, polisher, editor, proofreader for each others' drafts of particular sections, ie everyone has a different role for each section of the writing.
One writer incorporates parts of the work of the others into a single piece.
The group works together physically co-writing from the outset. This is the most challenging method, although it can work well if all respect the judgements of others and are not afraid of having their suggestions altered or rejected.
One member begins a draft, a second group member adds to the rough draft of the first, then the third member has a go etc. The document keeps rotating until every one is happy with the it.
From the outset the group allocates one member to the primary task of writing. The others do the research and background for the writer who builds up the report in consultation with the group.

Group concepts and tools

Group formation, size, membership and heterogeneity

Group building

Collaborative writing