Group Work Dynamics Tracking

One of the challenges I have with assessment is providing accurate and supportable evaluation of learning skills. In our board, learning skills are not suppose to be assessed as part of a student's term mark. If we are assessing knowledge, that assessment should be solely based on the student's knowledge and not whether they miss the first ten minutes

of class every, single, day. The obvious issues with that aside, my department has been working on developing a method for effectively tracking one of the key learning skills; that being, a student's ability to work effectively in a group, which we assess as either excellent, good, satisfactory, or needs improvement.

The challenge is that most of our record keeping, and time, is focussed on formative and summative assessment that is used to inform a student's mark in the course. So how can we use technology to better support the learning skills evaluation and inform our teaching practices all without adding a significant amount of additional paper work?

What I have done to help is modify a chart that has been developed by my department head and department members (who borrowed the idea from somewhere long ago), over the last few years. The chart is used to identify group dynamics when working in teams.

The issue that I have had with this chart is that when a completed chart is given to students they rarely look at it and they certainly do not keep it long enough to help in their next group work situation. And to be honest, when I use the chart with the intention of keeping it as support for report cards, I have misplaced them more than once.

By creating a Google Form, I am able to fill in the chart for each group and provide them access to the results spreadsheet. This allows them to receive immediate feedback that they can then refer to either the next day or later in the semester and reflect on how they can improve. This feedback is then also available for me when I am providing comments on report cards. Not only can I provide feedback, but because Google Forms can be set to automatically collect the respondents Google Ed email address, I can have groups self-evaluate and know the source of the insights, which in turn helps me better understand the disparity between what I see and what the students think they are doing.

This Group Work Tracking form is going to be particularly useful in a new, upcoming unit in my grade 12 English course where the students will be working on a team project for four weeks while they plan a pro surfing tour stop. The groups will receive daily feedback, be given time to reflect on the feedback at the beginning of each class, and the group-assigned project manager that week will be responsible for developing feedback as well. Not only will this Google Form allow me to make more informed decisions for report cards, but it will be a useful teaching tool that allows for hands-off learning opportunities.