Group work and collaboration are buzz words for almost every job on the market right now, but not all industries center writing and communication in the same way that we do as technical communicators. So, how do we expose students in the sciences (for example) to the multifaceted topic of collaboration? In chapter 9 of The Rhetoric, Science, and Technology of 21st C Collaboration, Ann Hall Duin et. al analyze collaboration through multiple lenses: rhetoric, science, and technology. Ultimately, they teach us how technology can be used to facilitate group work activities and overall increase classroom collaboration.

Because I Said So: Motivating Groups to Collaborate

In this chapter, Duin et. al make the all-too relevant point that “instructors often face challenges in motivating students to strive while completing group work and in finding systematic ways to evaluate progress and the quality of collaborative projects,” (173). This reading has allowed me to think about how important it is to equip my students with the tools they need to leave my classroom and confidently navigate group work (even if they still hate it!).

Sometimes, I think it’s easy to take it personally when student feedback or engagement reveals they don’t like group work. Whether students explicitly tell us that they don’t like group work, or they imply it with their failure to participate, it becomes very easy to ignore this issue and tell ourselves, “It doesn’t really matter if they want to work in groups or if they like working in groups, because they have to work in groups.” But from an audience awareness approach, that student feedback is valid and relevant.

Why do our students hate group work?

Many reasons come to mind:

• Unequal distributions of work;
  Varying efforts to consistently communicate;
  Varying life circumstances that affect life outside of class time;

… and many more reasons not listed here.

Even groups with strong planning and implementation abilities, who nail the collaborative component of an assignment and ace their final submission, may struggle with evenly dividing the work or frequently checking in with partners. There’s a reason that we teach collaboration and group work in our TCP courses: they are complex, difficult skills! But we are trained rhetors. We understand how to respond to the needs of our audiences. In this case, our audiences– our students– need a bridge to better access collaboration. It is the “role of the instructor is to facilitate a learning atmosphere that encourages students to claim shared ownership of their project,” and I believe this can be accomplished through use of technology in the classroom (174).

Tech is the Tool to Bridge the Gap

Technology shouldn’t take the place of building a dynamic and enriching classroom community, but students can benefit from having multiple ways of entry into collaborative spaces. For example, in informal class discussions about assigned readings in SciComm, I know for a fact that my students benefit the most when they pay attention– shocker! And for me, an enriching classroom community, or “learning hub” occurs when students engage with course concepts and vocabulary to articulate their opinions and express ideas. But where technology plays a key role is when students are unable to meet traditional standards of participation.

In an ideal world, every person with the privilege of getting an education would also have the privilege of prioritizing school over other things. Unfortunately, many students struggle with attendance and/or consistently submitting work. Also unfortunate is the fact that even well-intentioned attendance and late work policies aren’t preventative; and it often feels like the issues that students associate with group work are impossible to support.

We can utilize technology to help us alleviate some of the symptoms for instructors and students alike, however. In our quest to help students to understand the purpose of collaboration and to make group work an accessible activity structure, we might use “team management platforms, online repositories, and any number of platforms and social media in support of global virtual teamwork,” (180). The team management platforms afforded by Blackboard can be tricky, but there are certainly ways for instructors to upload content for groups and shape class activities around these modules. For technology to help bridge a gap that addresses one or more of the aforementioned reasons why students hate group work, instructors must carefully scrutinize their own perspective of “class participation.” If technology enables a student to participate in their group work, even when they are absent from class, and if that student faces a penalty for their absence anyway…

Then, in the interest of maximizing the amount of opportunity our students have to learn, we should let them continue to try to learn. Technology can help us to address several of the issues that students attach to collaborative class projects. If we continue to listen to our students and respond to their needs, we might use Duin et. al’s suggestions here to positively influence the way students feel about group work.