Preparing Students for Group Work
Students need help developing the skills necessary to be
effective collaborators. Here are some suggestions for
helping students work effectively with others, in your class
and in the world beyond.
Explain the importance of collaborating.
At times, you may encounter resistance to group work from
students. Students may be more receptive if they are re-
minded that collaborative environments foster creativity, and
collaborative abilities are vital for success as a working artist
and/or business professional. Share your experiences with
collaborative endeavors to support these ideas. Or, share
the following quote from the Pixar website:
“We concentrate on finding people with breadth, depth,
communication skills and the ability to collaborate.
If you have those attributes, we can teach you the tools.”
—www.pixar.com/companyinfo/jobs/career_faq.html
Discuss the characteristics of good collaborators.
Let students know what to aspire to. Give students feed-
back on their collaborative skills, and/or encourage them to
reflect on their own abilities in these areas. Characteristics
might include:
• Contributes many ideas.
• Listens attentively and encourages others to share ideas.
• Thoroughly completes assigned individual tasks on time.
Structure collaborative activities and projects
Structure, especially for first-year students, will provide the
clarity of purpose needed to make a group experience
successful.
• Assign a clear task for groups to accomplish.
• Provide steps to follow, on the board or in a handout.
• Set time limits/deadlines for groups to complete
their task(s).
© 2009, Academy of Art University. Faculty Development: http://faculty.academyart.edu. 415.618.3855
• Communicate expectations for how groups will
work together.
• Assign a role to each member of the group to guide
participation and help students develop relevant skills.
Incorporate roles from your industry such as, art director,
copywriter, client or target audience member.
• Teach or model necessary social skills.
Help Students Stay Focused
• Stay involved throughout the process. Interact with
each group and be available for consultations.
• Have group members rotate and take on various
roles in the group.
• Encourage groups to solve problems that arise, but
intervene if necessary to help a group identify ways
to move past hurdles.
Give students who are more experienced collaborators
more responsibility.
Students with more collaboration skills may also be able to:
• Identify their own group goals, create agendas, and
establish priorities.
• Set time limits and/or deadlines for themselves.
• Clarify and delegate individual roles/responsibilities.
• Organize meetings outside of class or online.
Provide feedback and/or grades based on clear criteria.
• Have groups demonstrate accomplishment of assigned
tasks—either orally or in written/created form.
• Have students write individual self-assessments to
describe their contributions to the group, as well
as assess their peers' contributions.
• Create a rubric to define your criteria for success.