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http://hdl.handle.net/11375/5627
Title: | Assigning students to groups for class projects: a test of two methods |
Authors: | Muller, Edward Thomas McMaster University, Faculty of Business |
Keywords: | Business;Business |
Publication Date: | Mar-1988 |
Series/Report no.: | Research and working paper series (McMaster University. Faculty of Business) no. 292 |
Abstract: | <p>Beheshtian-Ardekani and Mahmood [1] recently proposed a method of assigning students to groups for class projects which considers a student's background, in order to achieve a balanced distribution of student skills among group members. By creating balanced groups of experienced and inexperienced students, they had assumed, but not shown, that the instructor would be giving weaker students a better chance to learn from the stronger members of a group, there would be greater synergistic learning effects, and students would be happier with the project experience. This experiment takes their approach to assign students to balanced groups using a people-sequential heuristic, then compares students' experiences with the group project against the experiences of students assigned randomly. The results show that balanced groups have a modest advantage over groups that are formed randomly. Students in balanced groups felt slightly more satisfied with and challenged by the group, and shared the workload more evenly. By comparison, students in randomly-assigned groups were much less unanimous or homogeneous in their sentiments about the quality of the group-project learning experience.</p> |
Description: | <p>21, 2 leaves ; Includes bibliographical references (leaf 15). ; "March, 1988."</p> |
URI: | http://hdl.handle.net/11375/5627 |
Identifier: | dsb/83 1082 4944105 |
Appears in Collections: | DeGroote School of Business Working Paper Series |
Files in This Item:
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fulltext.pdf | 416.08 kB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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