During the first week of Topic 3 about Collaboration our group talked about which subject to research. We talked about different ideas and seemed to agree on what was most interesting. At last our facilitator asked us to formulate our subject as a question. I said ”What are the pros and cons with group work?” And our facilitator replied ”Is group work equal to collaboration?”.
Hmm.. maybe
not?
Later that week I listened to a podcast episode from Teaching in higher ed – Collaboration with guest Maha Bali. She said something that I think was important – If a group of four students is assigned an assignment then it should not be possible for only two students to accomplish it. An assignment for four student should be designed for four students. Otherwise what’s the point?
My own experience is that assignments in group work often is just seen as something that you need to get done. Back when I was a student we often had group work. I remember one time when we got introduced to an assignment that we where going to execute during the next two weeks. After being divided into groups I asked the others in my group what time they wanted to meet the next morning. The answer was ”Why do we need to meet tomorrow? The deadline isn’t until two weeks.” This made me feel frustrated for having group members with such low ambitions. But looking back I can also see their point. Because this assignment might not have been challenging or relevant enough to keep us occupied for this period of time.
In the article Creating effective collaborative learning groups in an online environment (Brindley, J., Blaschke, L. M. & Walti, C. 2009) ten factors for succesfull collaborative learning where identified. One of them where ”Monitoring and feedback”. Remembering my own scenario, we where basically left to our own devices during these couple of weeks. So, no wonder that my group did not feel motivated to start right away.

Being in the ONL course I get a new perspective on collaboration. There is definetly a scense of that the process and our personal development is what matters – and that the interaction in the group is a large part of that. I appreciate that there is clarity about what is expected from me to pass the course. And at the same time, we have a lot of freedom to design our group project. In the article by Brindley, Blaschke and Walti one of the factors for success is to ”Establish a healthy balance between structure (clarity of task) and learner autonomy (flexibility of task)”. I think that it’s easier said then done but I think ONL has managed to find this balance. Since we have close contact with our facilitator, we can feel secure that we are within the frame of what we are suppose to do in the course.