In the Teaching Tips section, we include some strategies that have worked well for many faculty members. Professors at campuses across the country are exploring the use of groups in their teaching. The research and experiences of professors, thus far, indicate several factors that are critical to successful groups, including the size and make up of student groups, the structure of group activities, and the design of group assignments. It means that groups, in most cases, are most successful if they work together for an entire course. Groups need to be heterogeneous with respect to the skills individuals bring to the group.
Skills can include previous course work, work experience, life experience, cultural experience, etc.
Often we let students form self-selected bands, but this does not generally lead to successful collaborative efforts because students are not likely to sort themselves out in a heterogeneous manner. To counter such tendencies, Barbara Millis and Larry Michaelsen suggest several strategies for forming heterogeneous groups. For example, if I am teaching a course on conservation biology and want to create seven heterogeneous groups of students, I can ask the students with professional or volunteer experience in the area of conservation to stand at one end of the room and the students with very little experience in conservation biology to stand at the other. I can then ask the other students to sort themselves out along the spectrum of experience with the topic at hand. Once they are in a line arranged from least to most experienced, they can simply count off 1 through 7 until everyone has been assigned a number.