The impact of group average feedback on students’ views of groupwork
Author
Lorna Jordan, MSc in Learning and Teaching
Summary
This teacher investigation, undertaken in the final year of the MSc in Learning and Teaching reports on an intervention to ‘influence student opinions of group work by providing a cooperative incentive in the form of group average feedback to termly learning reviews’, finding that the intervention increases ‘student motivation and likeliness to contribute’. The study, which was conducted with mathematics classes in Year 7 and Year 9 revealed important differences between different classes, depending in part on their prior attainment. While the Year 7s identified possible issues with uneven work distribution as well as anxieties around ‘looking stupid’, the Year 9’s appeared much more concerned about the social aspects of group work.