Group development and team roles

Group activities or collaborative tasks are commonly recommended in the educational literature for enhancing student learning and developing transferrable and professional skills. Some teachers react to this suggestion with a brief look of panic and/or an almost perceptible flinch. Group work can be messy, and it can take a lot of organising. But when it works, it works very well for learning.

One of the key ingredients to effective teamwork is taking the time and making the effort to define roles and tasks. Online or face-to-face, students involved in group work need support with team working skills. Here are some key ideas about team work in general to think about.

A very good starting place for thinking about the factors for effective group work is Johnson and Johnson (1987, 1989, Johnson, Johnson & Smith 2007) seven conditions for effective group co-operation:

positive interdependence (‘students must believe that they sink or swim together’ (2007 p 23))
individual accountability (members contribute their fair share)
promotive interaction (group members help each other)
effective group processing (reflecting on how to improve group and individual performance)
social skill
trust
effective conflict resolution

As an online tutor setting our students a group task, we need to ask ourselves, how well have these seven factors been accounted for in the design and support of this task? For example, we might ask, are students well enough trained in group working skills to assume they know how to maintain effective group processing, or should we scaffold such processes for them? And so on.

Tuckman's 1965 group development sequence is one of several models that remains popular. It suggests four stages to group development (a fifth stage was added later but it isn’t really relevant here):

Forming – in which members are dependent on the leader for guidance and direction. Individual roles and responsibilities are unclear. Processes are often ignored, and members will test the boundaries of the system and leader.
Storming – in which decisions don't come easily. Team members vie for position as they attempt to establish themselves in relation to other team members and the leader, who might receive challenges from team members.
Norming – in which agreement and consensus begins to emerge. Roles and responsibilities are clear and accepted. Big decisions are made by group agreement. Smaller decisions may be delegated to individuals or small teams within group. Commitment and unity is strong. The team may engage in fun and social activities.
Performing – in which the team knows clearly why it is doing what it is doing. It has a shared vision and is able to stand on its own feet with no interference or participation from the leader.

Jaques and Salmon (2007) present a seven-stage process of online group development based on Johnson and Johnson (1987). The stages are:

Defining and structuring procedures
Conforming to procedures and getting acquainted
Recognising mutuality and building trust
Rebelling and differentiating
Committing to and taking ownership for the goals, procedures and other members
Functioning maturely and productively
Terminating

As a group participant it can be helpful to think through questions like, 'at which stage of this process are we presently operating?' and 'how can we move forward to stage 6?' Whereas, as an online tutor, the questions are more about how groups can be best supported to move efficiently through these stages.

Belbin’s (1981) team roles are helpful to think about. Which of these describe you? What about your fellow team members: have you categorised any of them using these sorts of headings from their online behaviours so far?

Are our online personas the same as our face-to-face ones? Or do people behave differently online? What are the implications of these observations for managing online groups? Salmon (2002) offers 9 patterns of online participation. Which of these describe you? Salmon gives suggestions for how the e-moderator should respond to each type. Just looking at the types, are there any responses that suggest themselves to you?

What are your team’s tasks? What roles do you need to allocate? What will be your schedule? Discuss and decide these things in your group.

References

Belbin, R. M. (1981). Management Teams. Heinemann.
Gibbs, G. (1994). Learning in teams: a student guide. Oxford: Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development.
Jaques, D. and Salmon, G. (2007). Learning in Groups: a handbook for face-to-face and online environments. Abingdon: Routledge.
Johnson, D., Johnson, R. and Smith, K. (2007). "The State of Cooperative Learning in Postsecondary and Professional Settings." Educational Psychology Review 19(1): 15-29.
Johnson, D. W. and Johnson, R. T. (1989). Cooperation and competition: Theory and research. Edina, Minnesota, Interaction Book Company.
Johnson, D. W. and Johnson, R. T. (1987). Joining together: group theory and group skills. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Salmon, G. (2002). E-tivities: the key to active online learning. London: Kogan Page..
Tuckman, B.W. (1965). "Developmental Sequence in Small Groups," Psychological Bulletin, vol. 63, pp. 384-399