In this blog post I will reflect and give you my thoughts around how valuable it is that the the participants in a team feel comfortable with each other and that this is one of the most important success factors for a successful learning experience.

I have worked as a team member in several projects and also I have been the project leader in some projects and the first thing that most projects starts with is a kick-off. During this kick-off the focus is mainly on getting to know each other and to give the members of the team a good overview of what the goal with the project is. I will make parallells to being a member of a project group and being a member of an online study group.

A project group is set together to solve a specific problem and together reach a set goal. The project group contains people with various backgrounds and competencies and they will only work with each other for a while, which can be a short while as well as a long while. A study group is a set of people that meet up because they want to learn something new in a specific area.

When I look at the first step in the Five Stage Model from Gilly Salmon I can see that it is built upon the same thinking as with kick-off’s and project work. In the first step ”Access and motivation” the participants is getting familiar with the online environment and the tools that will be used in the online course. The participants can also share with each other what motivates them to participate in the course and the team sets the ground rules for collaboration. This looks very much the same in a project group that meet up for the first time. It is very important that the kick-off contains an introduction to the tools that the project group will use to collaborate and that group understand why they are in the group and that they are introduced to the content of the project and the project goal. If I have a look at the Community Of Inquiry framework (COI) then both in the study group and the project group there is a high level of social presence in this first step since the group here sets the plattform for open communication and group cohesion. The teacher presence is also high at this level since it is the teacher/project leader who will introduce the goal, design and structure of the course/project and who will give the participants access to the tools.

Moving forward we get to the second step in the Five Stage Model, i.e ”Online Socialisation”. In this step the group shall get to know each other better so that an effective (learning) team can be formed. The design in an online course should here provide e-tivities that let the participants know more about each other so that bridges can be built between cultural, social and learning environments. For example let the participants introduce themselves with six descriptive words, let the participants give one URL that illustrates their favorite hobby, let the participants describe how they relax, let the participants describe what three items they would want to have with them if they where stranded on an island and describe why they chose these items etc. The design for a kick-off could contain the same type of activities, but I also think that this step contains teambuilding activities that will break the ice between the participants. The final goal is the same, i.e that the participants in the group shall be comfortable to work together as a team during the course/project. I think that this step is important for the group to be able to have a cognitive presence later on in the learning/project process, i.e so that they look at information and tasks with a critical mind and most important that they can feel free to share there thoughts and doubts with the other participants in the group.