Inclusive Group Work

Providing opportunities for students to work in groups expands options for students to share their understanding, express uncertainty in a lower-risk environment, and improve their communication ond other teamwork skills.  When facilitated properly, this active-learning strategy is inclusive of the different skills and perspectives present within a diverse student group.

A well-intentioned desire to get students to interact with their classmates may inadvertently create an unwelcoming situation for students if the activity is not properly facilitated.  Just like you would not give a presentation or lecture without advance preparation, similarly you should prepare your group-work teaching activity before getting students involved.  One thing you will want to do is prepare the students in advance for what they will be doing, how it will be done and why.  Communicating clearly with students your intentions for their learning and how particular activities are part of that goal is very important for maintaining their trust in a process that may be new to them.  Sharing the details of the strategy in advance also communicates that they will have structure to support their learning in this activity.

To ensure inclusiveness when using a group-work strategy you should begin by creating the groups yourself.  There are features in typical LMS or stand-alone tools, such as CATME that can help with this for larger courses.  This is inclusive because it prevents some students from being left out while others get the comfort of interacting only with friends:

1. If you will use an occasional Think-Pair-Share (TPS) strategy, you can do a simple assignment by labeling students A-B-A-B-etc. (or count off 1-2-1-2-etc.) and then ensure that all students are partnered with someone so that no student ends up alone.  You can add a third student to a “pair” if needed, but do not let the “pairs” grow any larger than three and make an effort to keep them at two. 
2. For more involved collaborative learning activities – such as problem solving in a team – assign students to groups using as much data as you have about the individual students so that you can create heterogeneous groups. Create teams that have no fewer than three students in them (ideal size) but no more than four students.  These sizes have been shown to maximize the productive interactions among all students in the team.  Heterogeneity based on performance is a gold standard; if you have any performance data (quiz or homework scores, grades from a pre-requisite course) you can base your initial team assignments on that.  Select one student from the upper third of the performance ranking, one from the middle third, and one from the bottom third. There are also recommendations about ensuring that no teams include only a single female or a single underrepresented person. When you have gotten to know your students more, you can incorporate other aspects of their skill sets or identities to create heterogenous teams. 

• It is recommended that teams remain together for an extended period of time, but not necessarily as long as a full semester.  Creating new teams once or twice during the semester helps to keep poor team dynamics from becoming entrenched and allows students to work with a diversity of classmates. 
• The first time that your pairs or teams engage with each other, (including after forming new teams mid-semester), provide them structured ways to get to know one another. Invite them to share information about themselves voluntarily, such as a list of 10 possible items to share and they can pick any three they want to share (and more if there is time).  Examples are name (and pronunciation), major, year in school, preferred pronouns, city/country of birth, city/country where you lived before coming to this college, pets, etc.  (Name tents, mentioned in Installment #1 of this Tipsheet, are very helpful for this.) Encourage people to refer to each other by their properly pronounced names and preferred pronouns as a show of mutual respect.  
• For teams, and still as part of the process of getting acquainted, give them time to create “rules of engagement” or “guidelines for being a team” based on the principles for interaction that they would like to see enacted in their team.  Encourage them to brainstorm consequences they will use to hold one-another accountable to their agreement.

Do not expect students to know how to make a successful team or pair conversation.  You will need to provide them with structure and guidance:

• For TPS, students may revert to just asking each other “what did you get?” if they are not given some guidance.  Ask them to explain the reasoning for each of their answers and then to try to reach consensus about the best response.
• For TPS, don’t shortchange or skip the “Think” portion of the strategy.  The individual work is necessary to allow each student to develop their own understanding of the question, which will in turn feed a more fruitful pair discussion.
• When you provide prompts or instructions to students working together, provide them both in written and verbal form. Remember that using multiple modes for conveying information is inclusive in a variety of ways for different types of students.

The success of teams can be greatly increased by providing individual roles for each student in the team.  The team should rotate roles each time it meets for problem-solving (though some sources recommend keeping the same roles for a team working on a long-term project). Be prepared to check that teams are actually implementing their roles and holding each team member accountable for their task. Recommended roles for problem-solving and project teamwork include (3, 7):

Manager or Facilitator: ensures that the group stays on task and that everyone gets to participate.

Recorder: takes notes of the team’s discussions, records a summary of the ideas voiced, and indicates who is taking which role in the team.

Reporter, Spokesperson or Presenter: presents the team’s findings to the rest of the class or instructor, using the recorder’s notes for guidance.

The instructor can select the role that a fourth team member will have, based on what seems most appropriate for the course.  Some examples are: timekeeper, harmonizer (to create a positive team atmosphere and help achieve consensus), checker (checks to make sure all individual group members understand the group’s conclusions), runner (gather’s materials needed by the team).

After your students work in teams or have pair discussions, have a plan ready for how you will call-in participants for the whole class discussion.  As mentioned in last week’s Tipsheet (Installment #3), cold calling on people or teams can provoke a great deal of anxiety.  But randomized calling based on team numbers or a randomization scheme (such as using a deck of playing cards or online random number generator) is more inclusive.  Also be clear about the amount of time each reporter has for sharing and stick to your timeline.

References:

Hogan, Kelly A. and Sathy, Viji. (2022). Inclusive Teaching: Strategies for Promoting Equity in the College Classroom. West Virginia University Press: Morgantown, WV.

Smith, K.A. (2011). Cooperative learning: Lessons and insights from thirty years of championing a research-based innovative practice. Paper prepared for the 41st ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference, Rapid City, SD, October 12–15, 2011.

Iowa State University, Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching. (n.d.) Instructor's Guide: Facilitating Group Work. 

Kent State University, Center for Teaching and Learning. (n.d.). Think, Pair, Share.

WUSTL Center for Teaching and Learning. (2023).  Teaching Resources: Using Roles in Group Work.