Suggestions for group collaborative activities.

1. Add your suggestions for group activities to this list:

1. We have used groupwork in one module where by students work together in varying 'topic groups'; where they research into topics e.g. 'Colour'. Students then work together in their 'assisgnment groups' to complete a problem based learning task. Each assignment group contains 1 student than has researched into a topic in each topic group.
2. We have used group work where students work as a group researching strands of a topic eg. national curriculum into key stages and then as a group they make a presentation, which can be assessed.
3. The use of groupwork varies with the students' stage of learning. For example, in the first term of year 1 at university, many students are shy and do not know each other very well. For this reason I set a group project in the second week of term, and put the students into mixed groups of five. My objective is that all students make a few new friends, and that fear / isolation does not lead to depression or course abandonment. The group project is big and general e.g. Which are the major student social events in Manchester, and how do these businesses market their offerings to new students in Manchester?
4. As students reach the second or final year of undergraduate study, the focus changes to something more academic and career / employment related e.g. in 3 years time, the BBC is relocating 6,000 jobs to Manchester and Salford. How does your chosen degree position you to apply for these jobs? Again, the students would need to do some research, and they would have to talk to each other. Groupwork is about developing ideas, using a range of skills, decision making, time/role/task management etc. It is not just about reducing the marking load in an age of large classes / mass education.
5. School newspaper making-up

2. How could you use a wiki in your own teaching?