Collaborative Assignments

What are Collaborative Assignments

Collaborative assignments and projects are defined as a High-Impact Practice (HIP) by the AAC&U (2024). This HIP focuses on “learning to work and solve problems in the company of others and sharpening one’s own understanding by listening seriously to the insights of others, especially those with different backgrounds and life experiences”(AAC&U 2024). Collaborative assignments can range from in-course study groups and team-based assignments to cooperative projects and research.

The 8 Elements of High Impact Practices

To maximize the impact of collaborative assignments, and ensure they are operating as a HIP, it’s helpful to consider Kuh and O’Donnell’s 8 Key Elements of High-Impact Practices, taken from their article “Ensuring quality & taking high-impact practices to scale”:

1. Performance expectations set at appropriately high level
2. Significant investment of concentrated effort by students over an extended period of time
3. Interactions with faculty and peers about substantive matters
4. Experiences with diversity, wherein students are exposed to and must contend with people and circumstances that differ from those with which students are familiar
5. Frequent, timely, and constructive feedback
6. Opportunities to discover relevance of learning through real-world applications
7. Public demonstration of competence
8. Periodic, structured opportunities to reflect and integrate learning

View this Key Features of High Impact Practices document for more information on the list above plus examples of each element.

While not every collaborative assignment needs to incorporate all eight elements listed above, it’s beneficial to analyze which elements are already naturally present in your collaborative work and which require further development. Consider the context of your course and existing assignments to identify areas for enhancement. To further refine your approach, explore the following: 

 

Further Refine Your Approach

Design and Implementation

• Designing a Collaborative Assignment

  When designing any assignment for your course, you should first consider the learning outcomes for your course and how the assignment or activity might help student achieve those outcomes.

  Next, think about how you want to organize the group or collaborative project, considering elements like the group size, how you will form groups, and, if necessary, what role each group member might have.

  Generally, groups include between 3-5 students per group. Consider whether you want to assign groups or have students form their own groups.

  If you do set up groups, consider having students establish a group contract and spend time getting to know each other.

  Think about assigning roles to groups—when done well, this strategy can help divide work and help students to feel comfortable in collaborative learning activities.

  Teach a large course? You can still use these strategies! Consider this resource from University of Massachusetts Amherst, or this one from Cornell’s Center of Teaching Innovation to help you consider how you might use collaborative learning in a larger class setting.

  Finally, clarify the assessment strategy. Is the activity designed for formative or summative purposes? Will students receive feedback from peers, and if so, how will they be encouraged to apply it? For more complex projects, will scaffolding and checkpoints be incorporated to support student success? For resources to help you think through how you might assess a collaborative project, jump to the Evaluating Collaborative Activities tab below. 

• Collaborative Assignment Examples and Ideas

  The following is a collection of resources to help you brainstorm ideas for creating your own collaborative assignments:

  • Group Presentation idea from Colorado State University’s Writing Center
  • Cornell University’s Center for Teaching Innovation resource: Ideas for group and collaborative assignments
  • Collaborative Learning/Learning with Peers from Dartmouth’s Writing Program
  • OTL Blog Post: High-Impact Practices in STEM Part 1: Collaborative Assignments
  • This huge guide (it is over 200 pages!) that contains all kinds of different activities, spanning from collaborative ice breakers to group activities for gathering feedback, to group activities you might use to conclude an course or experience
  • Not every collaborative assignment needs to be your typical small group activity. Consider ways your students might collaborate with their peers by learning together in online discussion spaces, creating collaborative knowledge bases or notes, or troubleshooting solutions as a class.
• Universal Design for Learning (UDL) Considerations for Collaborative Assignments

  When designing collaborative assignments, it is important to keep in mind you are working with a diverse group of students who bring unique perspective and different strengths to the classroom and to their groups. So, how can you design a collaborative assignment or group experiences to support all learners?

  Consider Universal Design for Learning (UDL). UDL is a “framework to guide the design of learning environments that are accessible, inclusive, and challenging for every learner. Ultimately, the goal of UDL is to support learner agency, the capacity to actively participate in making choices in service of learning goals” (CAST 2024). The UDL guidelines which emphasize multiple means engagement, representation,  and action and expression, serve as a practical tool for designing inclusive instruction.

  Applying the UDL framework to collaborative work means creating flexible and inclusive environments where all participants can access, engage with, and contribute meaningfully to the collaborative process. Here are some resources to help you think through what it means to universally design collaborative activities:

  • This great resource from MSU Denver talks in depth about designing group work with UDL.
  • This article presents a study analyzing the effects of UDL strategies on group work, highlighting their ability to foster engagement among diverse student populations.
  • This video from North Dakota State University’s Office of Teaching and Learning talks through using UDL strategies to design group work.
• Technology and Collaboration

  Technology can support collaboration, especially if students are working asynchronously. Explore the resources linked below for more information about how technology can support collaborative learning:

  • This resource guide from Saint Louis University contains some ideas for integrating technology into a collaborative assignment or project.
  • MIT’s Step Lab has a webpage (Collaborative AI for Learning, or CAIL) that is a “research and design project focused on integrating innovative AI tools in the classroom to support learning in collaborative groups” (CAIL, 2024)
  • You can set up groups within your Canvas course shell. These groups provide students with a collaborative workspace to share files, collaborate on activities, and prepare group assignments.
  • Other educational technology tools you might use for collaborative assignments include:
  • Perusall (social annotation tool)
  • Padlet (Digital bulletin board)
  • Harmonize (online discussion tool)
  • Mural (digital whiteboard/mind mapping tool)
  • Create collaborative Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, OneDrive collaborations in Canvas
  • Create a collaborative ePortfolio in Digication
  • And many more! To explore additional ed tech tools that may not be listed here, please check out our “Picking the Right Ed Tech Tool” resources, or reach out to the OTL (otl@du.edu).
• Evaluating Collaborative Activities

  Assessing collaborative work can be tricky. This is because evaluating collaborative work requires attention to both the final product and the students’ learning process. One way to clarify how you are assessing groups and ensure consistent grading is by creating clear rubrics. Use the resources below to help you think about how you are assessing your collaborative projects:

  • Consider asking students working in a group to complete a self or peer evaluation. Here are some Sample peer and self evaluation questions from Penn State.
  • The AAC&U’s Value Rubrics are helpful tools for assessing numerous skills. In particular, consider their rubric for Teamwork.
  • The University of New Orleans has a sample rubric for collaboration, as does Cleveland State University.

  If you need help designing a rubric for a collaborative assignment, please reach out to the OTL’s Director of Academic Assessment, Stephen Riley: Stephen.Riley@du.edu 

 

Revising Your Course

After reviewing the resources listed above, select an assignment or course activity to revise, or create something brand new.

If you already have an assignment: Use the information that you have learned throughout this web page to revise your assignment and incorporate the qualities listed above.

• What changes did you make?
• How do these changes ensure that the assignment is now a high-impact collaborative assignment? Specifically, how will this change the way students interact with the course material, their peers, and their instructor?
• What resources did you use to inform your revision?
• What other steps do you need to take to incorporate the assignment into your course?

If you are creating a new assignment:

• How do you envision this assignment changing the way students interact with the course material, their peers, and their instructor?
• What resources did you use to inform your assignment?
• What still needs to be developed, changed, or created?

References

AAC&U. (2024). High-impact practices. AAC&U.org. https://www.aacu.org/trending-topics/high-impact  

CAST (2024). Universal Design for Learning Guidelines version 3.0. Retrieved from https://udlguidelines.cast.org

Kuh, G., & O’Donnell, K. (2013). Ensuring quality & taking high-impact practices to scale. American Association of Colleges & Universities.