Online projects are excellent tools for learning - they encouage students to refine their technological expertise and work in a group of their peers. Facilitating online projects can be a little sticky, so be patient and remember that you're learning too. What follows is a collection of advice from a variety of sources on technology in teaching and group work.
The pioneering paper on technical group work is
Cooperative Learning in Technical Courses: Procedures, Pitfalls, and Payoffs", by Richard Felder and Rebecca Brent. The 1994 study was funded by the National Science Foundation and
should be a helpful resource for you.
"Collaborative Learning: Group Work and Study Teams", by
Barbara Gross Davis. An excerpt from a book on learning strategies.
Here's a collection of helpful tips on group work collected by researchers at San Francisco State University.
The Center for Research and Teaching recommends several other resources on teaching with technology and group work.
It isn't easy to help your students make a web page when you're still grappling with web technologies
yourself! That's why we've created "The University of Michigan Student's 1-2-3 Guide to Making a Web Page".
Open the PDF file, save it to your desktop, and print out copies for your students. Believe us, they'll
thank you.
If you'd like your students to create group web pages for use in Coursetools,
please see Setting up a Group Project in Coursetools. Please
refer your students to some of the sites listed below for further assistance in creating web pages.
Advice on Group Work
Helping Your Students Build and Maintain Web Pages
Helpful Resources:
Copyright 2002 - University of Michigan School of Nursing
Information Technology Support - All Rights Reserved.