NovoEd Social Learning Tools: Teams Or Groups, Which Should I Use?

The advantages of team-based and group-based learning are clear, ranging from more opportunities to engage in social learning to greater levels of accountability, but how do you take advantage of the team and group tools on NovoEd’s online learning platform? Although both are based in social learning, they provide different distinct advantages and opportunities.
Groups are the less structured of the two – a learner can join an infinite number of course groups and tend to be larger in size. There are two main situations to use groups:
Teams, on the other hand, are more structured than groups – a learner can only be on one course team at a time, and teams have the ability to submit an assignment together for team deliverables. When should teams be used?
When using either teams or groups, make sure the purpose is clear to the learners – you want to make sure the learner understands the value being provided. The best uses will enable learners to understand what they will gain from the social interactions, and orient them towards taking full advantage of the social learning opportunities provided.
What about using teams and groups together? Teams and groups can be used together, but we recommend some caution if you decide to use both. In order to avoid overwhelming learners, using both effectively requires being extra clear about the purposes for each. Additionally, you want to avoid overlap between similar types of activities, such as having groups be responsible for informal feedback and teams also being responsible for a more formal feedback.
Good luck with using teams and groups – we look forward to seeing how you use teams and groups effectively in your next course!
If you enjoyed this content, be sure to also check out our Formal and Informal Feedback article.
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