Great Group Work | Even Better Teaching Series

Who loves group work? …anyone? Even as instructors, you will have experienced less than effective group work in your academic life: co-authors who don’t contribute much, research colleagues who stop responding to emails, struggling to find a time to for an entire committee to meet, rushing at the last minute to collect contributions…

The challenges that we face with group work are the same ones that our students face when we ask them to collaborate to complete assignments!In this session, we’ll consider how thoughtful assignment design can lead to effective and equitable group work for students.

By reviewing why students (or anyone) may have resistance towards group work (Stover & Holland, 2017), we’ll then identify elements within courses, and more specifically – within assignments – that will help students more effectively participate in and appreciate the value of group work.

Bring one of your assignments that asks students to complete group work (or come ready with an idea for a group works assignments) and we’ll work together to make it even better!

Even Better Teaching Series

Whether you are new to post-secondary teaching or have lots of experience in university classrooms, these 60 minutes sessions are designed to provide you with concrete strategies and researched-backed approaches to add to your teaching toolkit. Build on your existing strengths and make your teaching practice even better by exploring ways to increase student engagement, try out practical and time-saving approaches to designing lessons and lesson materials, and evaluate student learning.

You’ll have the opportunity to share what works for you as an instructor, learn from peers across the university, explore current good practice in teaching and learning, review and apply empirically-tested teaching methods, and leave each session with new resources and activities to try in your next lecture, seminar, or tutorial.

Already have an established teaching practice that works for you? Looking for new ideas to try out in class? Attend any of the Even Better Teaching sessions to take your already effective teaching and make it even better!

Facilitator

Megan Robertson

Megan Robertson, PhD, is an Educational Developer with CEE’s Curriculum and Instruction Division. She is committed to supporting instructors develop effective and engaging teaching practices that are focused on student learning.