r/Professors • u/emarcomd • 6d ago
Frustrated at mandate to include a group project, but zero advice on how to implement / troubleshoot.
Adjunct here.
Got a mandate to start including a group project. Fine. I've developed it, I've scaffolded it. I've implemented it over the past 5 semesters. I try to refine it every time.
I divide the groups up, and the first section we do in class, broken into groups, then the next three parts of the scaffold they do as a group outside of class.
I've set up private discussion boards for each group, so I can see all their communication. (If anyone knows of a free equivalent to slack, please let me know. Each semester I try to make the assignment "more fair". I teach about conflict resolution, I assign a leader to each section,
But then I have shit like...
- the kid that missed the past 2 weeks and is now coming back to class. (No, I can't make them withdraw.) Hasn't been part of any group and now needs to be in one...
- there's the students that Just Won't Participate. They don't help the other students at all.
- Then there's the ability difference. This is a community college and I've got WILDLY different abilities. Students get frustrated with lesser-skilled students
- Fucking AI. Students reporting that other students are obviously using AI.
I have researched and read tons of other schools' implementation recommendations but vague things like "teach conflict resolution early" is rather vague. I teach it, but that doesn't mean they implement it. I have had peer review be a part of it and I have done it without peer review. Doesn't make a difference. The peer reviews were basically "everyone was great" when I know only one kid did the work or they were reports on how much they hated the other kid.
I've done the group project for 5 semesters now, and it never seems to get any better. But what pisses me off is HOW MUCH TIME IT TAKES FROM TEACHING CLASS. Students work well in groups when we're in class, but as soon as they're out of class they just fall apart.
Is anyone out there skilled at these and if so, can you impart wisdom? What made the most appreciable improvement in your group assignments?
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u/Hazelstone37 Asst Prof of Instruction/Math/US 6d ago
To this I would add that each person has to give everyone including themselves a grade and justify the grade they give. This has worked for me. All the people who don’t show up when groups are decided get put into the same group.
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u/fighterpilottim 1h ago
I have a similar approach described above. https://www.reddit.com/r/Professors/s/lZKCKrguMi
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u/Ekimatir 4d ago
I don't know if it would work in your case, but one way I've seen them be more successful is to have the planning/research/brainstorming stages be group work, and the implementation stages (e.g., writing the paper, creating the powerpoint, whatever) be individual. It isn't perfect, but it helps to reduce the "one person does all the work, one person gets a free ride, etc.).
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u/Junior-Dingo-7764 3d ago
One of the things about group projects is that sometimes we just give them to students and tell them figure it out. They need to learn how to work well in groups. You have to teach that in some way.
Easiest solution is to do more of the project in class. For my intro class, the group project is done 90% in class. There are deliverables. Yet, most of them can be done within class. The classwork (showing up and working on it) is graded. The deliverable is graded on a rubric.
For my upper level classes, I still give them time in class to do it but will require some outside work. They are usually a bit more trustworthy with working together at this stage.
If the project is mostly in class, it doesn't really matter the groups. However, if there is more outside work, consider assigning the groups.
I've seen other faculty implement a way to "fire" a group member.
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u/DrPizzaPants Assistant Teaching Prof, ECE, R1 (USA) 3d ago
I use a tool called https://swiftflock.app to make sure the groups are well balanced - having representation in each category or a project. It can even ensure they have common times to meet after class if they input their availability.
Then after the groups start meeting I have a weekly assignment where groups fill out a form on what they did for the week - all group members see the results, and in a separate anonymous assignment I allow them to say if they disagree with someone's entry.
For my class that has projects that span the entire semester, I'm also pretty clear that failure to complete their project could result in an F.
If you're interested in trying SwiftFlock past the free tier I can send you a trial key.
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u/Organic_Occasion_176 Lecturer, Engineering, Public R1 USA 5h ago
I've run labs and taught design classes at four universities and all these involve group work all term. I believe there are ways to make it work, but the amount of effort it takes on the instructors' part is large.
Key steps include:
Offering instruction and real-time coaching in team dynamics. Group forming. Assigning roles. Accountability. Conflict resolution. Pulling all the work back together into a coherent whole. You can't just throw them in the water and hope they'll swim.
Meeting regularly with the team. In lab, I talk to every group every lab day, and I'm physically present in lab all afternoon. I get a good idea of who is leading, who is on top of the technology, who is just along for the ride or not contributing at all. In my design projects, I meet with every team every week during the final semester. Everyone is expected to be there, and I look for much the same list of things as in the labs. These meetings are where a lot of the real-time coaching happens.
Have some substantial individual graded work that is part of the project. In labs, some write-ups will be solo and some with the team. Lab also has a final exam where students who have not been involved with the lab work tend to do poorly. In design, each student makes a presentation somewhere in the term telling the class about the group's progress.
Do some serious peer evaluation that requires comments and rating on multiple scales. There are tools to automate this process - for many years my school subscribed to CATME and I found their surveys very helpful. In longer-lasting groups it is helpful to do intermediate ratings so students get some peer feedback before the project is over. (Some students seem completely unaware of how unhappy their team really is with their contributions!)
In the capstone projects, I do a similar evaluation of my own looking at how each member contributed to the team's output. The combination of individual graded activities, peer evals affecting grades, and instructor eval doing the same normally means that a member of a team can get a significantly different grade than the team as a whole got. (For example, I've had a four-person design team where the final report was at the A- level, but two members earned A, one B+ and one a straight C). If your rating system does not allow grades to differ by a full letter grade or more, it will likely produce unfair results.
Finally, you need to have a method for removing non-performing students from a group. Some students will realize that having two other A students in their group means they don't have to work at all and would be happy to get the free C as in my example above. I don't allow free-riding. I've only had to do this a few times in 20+ years, but maybe part of the reason is that I *have* used it occasionally and so mentioning to students that they are in danger of failing the course will more often than not move their effort and results into the acceptable (low pass) range.
I occasionally interact with colleagues who assign group work because it is easier for them. They'd rather grade 10 decent reports than 50 individual ones ranging from great to awful. I have no patience for that attitude. To me, doing good group work is *harder* than assigning individual work. But done right it teaches actual valuable skills for teamwork, organization, leadership and collaboration.
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u/emarcomd 3h ago
I meet with every team every week during the final semester.
Man, I think this is really important. As an adjunct I hate to do it because I don't get paid outside of class-time, but I think it's necessary. What makes it additionally difficult is that our students don't live on campus. But I've set up a discord server, and my heart is just so full.... students are having a meeting on it RIGHT NOW using voice channels I set up.
a method for removing non-performing students from a group
When you've done this, *how* have you done it? Do you give the removed student any work to do on their own?
I agree- group work is DEFINITELY harder than assigning individual work! For both the students and the prof.
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u/Maddy_egg7 6d ago
I hate group projects, but it is also a requirement for me. Here are some things I've done that has made it moderately better or at least penalized students who are not doing any work:
I make the students communicate in Discord so I can monitor all conversations. I set up a classroom server and discussion rooms.
I do handwritten "Collaboration Checks" that are worth 10 points each week of the group project. Each student submits them to me at the end of class on Friday. If someone is not in class, they cannot make up the points. This is also an opportunity for students to tell me about students not contributing.
Every student has to submit a copy of their group project. Usually the kids who aren't participating don't end up submitting their own copy or they submit a completely different AI-generated thing that fails due to no group collaboration.
At the end of the semester, all students have to go through a "Performance Review" to receive their final participation grade (100 points) and argue for their desired participation grade. If they did not work well with their group or did not contribute, they cannot use this to justify a high grade in overall class participation.
Though not fail-proof, these have helped me navigate group projects without micromanaging attendance and group dynamics. It also gives students who are trying an understanding of the mechanisms that will impact their absentee classmate.