Group Work Challenges

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Group work is a learning activity that many instructors are used to assigning in traditional classroom settings.
It 's a good way to get students interacting and collaborating, and groups can work together on projects that are too large for one student to complete in a semester. While this group work can benefit students as they enter the real world, it can also present some challenges when completing projects with their peers.
The advantages of students doing group collaboration online are as follows:
1. It exposes students to critical thinking.
2. It creates an environment that involves learning from peers.
3. It allows students to gain additional perspectives on different subjects.
4. It allows students to learn new platforms to communicate …show more content…

11. The chance to improve virtual communication skills: it can be easy to lose track of the tone one is projecting when interacting online. Constructive feedback can come across as critical or arrogant.
12. Increased knowledge retention: A good online program takes full advantage of the interactive power of social and multimedia. Multimedia tools have been scientifically proven to improve memory by providing strong sensory cues that help us remember what we learn.
So overall, online education can provide a richer and more interactive classroom, which allows students to develop good virtual communication skills and utilizes the power of multimedia to help students remember what they learn.
While completing a group project in a virtual environment can help students learn to work with others, it can also present unique challenges. Few challenges are discussed below:

1. Some students do not care for the idea of group work and can be apathetic, or even on occasions actively hostile to the whole idea. Given that it is relatively commonplace for students to voluntarily congregate in groups to discuss assignment problems and solutions outside of class times, it would seem especially …show more content…

2. In situations where students who have not previously been introduced to group work, and lack the necessary skills, any instructor who uses group work as a major component, and does not prepare the students appropriately, is almost inevitably condemning the students to a traumatic and probably unproductive experience.
3. Courses conducted online or by distance education notoriously suffer from higher than average attrition rates, often because of feelings of isolation. With group work, it is common for those students who remain in the group to feel disadvantaged if one or more of their members officially withdraws, or disappears from the group for whatever reason. This has the potential to be the most serious, since the student concerned may have been assigned some component vital to the success of the group as a whole. While the withdrawn student can be awarded zero, what should happen to the other members of the group?
4. Due to new technologies constantly emerging, students face the challenge of deciding on which technology best serves their purpose. For example, Google Docs might be used to edit assignments and communication among groups member may take place over emails or Skype. Students are expected to be tech-savvy and the motivation to learn new techniques must be