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April 26, 2006

Teaching Collaboration

Arta Szathmary at Bucks County Community College sent TeachingMIS some interesting projects that she uses to teach teamwork and collaboration.  In one exercise, she gives student groups the following picture:

And asks her student teams to assess what might be happening with this team.  She asks, from the picture, what can you tell about the people, their process, the nature of their work, and so forth?  (The small black box in front the person in the black shirt is an abacus, not a PDA.)  Her goal is to encourage the students to consider various elements of group process by thinking about a different group.

She then assigns project concerning intellectual property rights in the movie industry.  Students then grade both their group and themselves.

Arta says it's a project in process and she's always looking for ways to improve it.  I like the idea of using pictures of groups as a way ferreting out group issues.

Take a look at the evaluation forms ... they could be useful for any teamwork project!

Thanks, Arta!