This personal reflective essay explores a group Dissertation in Practice (DiP) model and process used in a localized Doctor of Education program. It describes and recommends this team-based DiP approach as an innovation that prepares practitioners to tackle complex problems of practice by focusing on a process centered around group dynamics that…

This study aims to examine if and how academic achievement and gender group composition affect the quality of online SGQ and the use patterns of procedural prompts provided to support SGQ activities. Forty-one university sophomores enrolled in an English as a foreign language class participated in a four-week study. All questions generated were…

Maybe you heard the line "managing programmers is like herding cats", and if you consider there is some truth behind this, then you should, perhaps, think how it is to teach people to perform this job. As we know from the research literature, there is no such thing as a consensus about the most suitable teaching method of a software…

In this article the selected works of Ernest Boyer are examined in the context of curricular and cocurricular integration. The authors argue that Boyer advocated for a closer connection between the academic and student affairs programs on American college campuses and further contend that this is particularly true and important for Christian…

One of the methods used most often to assess students' friendships and friendship networks is the reciprocal nomination method. However, an often heard complaint is that this technique produces rather negative outcomes. This study compares the reciprocal nomination method with another method to assess students' friendships and friendship networks:…

Group work is used as a means of learning at all levels of most educational systems. However, teachers often use group work without considering its "pros and cons." Such a mode of non-reflected application may sometimes end up in positive experiences and learning, but the likelihood is that the outcome will be the opposite. The aim of…

Many students cringe and groan when told that they will need to work in a group. However, group work has been found to be good for students and good for teachers. Employers want college graduates to have developed teamwork skills. Additionally, students who participate in collaborative learning get better grades, are more satisfied with their…

School federations are groups of two or more schools operating under a single governance structure. The study reported in this article compared federations designed to raise performance in low-attaining schools against a matched sample of their non-federated counterparts. The findings are based on quantitative analysis of data collected in…

What kinds of teacher collaboration are most likely to improve what teachers--and, ultimately, students--learn during their time in school? This study looks within and across different collaborative activities that occurred among one teacher team. Observational data analyzed through a sociocultural theoretical framework suggest how the structure…

The objective of the exercise described here is to teach students about group formation using group concepts and theory. It also provides a unique way to form work groups for class projects. Students will become more aware of the reasons people join groups, the benefits groups provide for them, and an understanding of how groups are formed. The…

Previous research suggested that social support, belongingness and mastery goals were related to the quality of cooperative learning (CL). In this in-depth study we explored how to differentiate between four effective CL teams and four ineffective CL teams, in terms of students' goals and perceptions of instructional conditions. Apart from the…

This article proposes a pedagogical framework to help students analyze their group and team interactions. Intersecting five fundamental group attributes (group size, group goal, group member interdependence, group structure, and group identity) with three overarching group processes (leadership, decision making, and conflict management) creates an…

This article discusses the use of teaching teams to encourage active learning in a business communication class. The author offers examples of short activities that can be used to help create an active learning environment. Some of these favorite activities include homework reviews, the value line, 3-2-1 processor, and muddiest point. In each of…

The present study focuses on the use of a cooperative methodology with university students during the last year of their degree programme. The task structure could be freely chosen, and there were no restraints on group decisions to deal with the classroom work. All the elements of cooperation were based on a reward structure. The results show…