3.2 Students see structured team training as useful.
To determine which components of the course are important as seen by the students we asked them to select which activities through semester they found useful and why (Figure 6A). We also asked them what they would do differently in future team experiences (Figure 6B); how much they used different aspects of Microsoft Teams (Figure 6C) and whether they used any additional software (Figure 6D).
Even though this is a third-year course, of the four Team Training sessions (which were all compulsory) the first session (about getting to know your team) was chosen as useful by 11/12 respondents. Half the respondents selected Team Training Session 3 (reflection on progress) and 5 selected Team Training Session 4 (negotiating author order) as useful. Even though the students said they experienced no conflict (Supplementary Material 5A) a quarter of the respondents still chose Team Training Session 2 (negotiation tips) as useful. These responses demonstrate that each session is considered useful to at least a third of the respondents (Figure 6A).
During week 2 (when the first Team Training session was run) the students were also given a tutorial on using Microsoft Teams. Even though the Microsoft Teams platform was having technical difficulties and only returned as the class ended, 9 of the 12 respondents still said this session was useful. They were provided with a handout with screenshots to help them (Supplementary Material 2). Similarly, the poster session with feedback was considered useful by 8 of the respondents (Figure 6A).
Interestingly 11 of the 12 respondents felt that having the sessions compulsory was useful (Figure 5A) Reasons for this included: “… ensured all the team would try to be present” (ID1) “..ensured we had deadlines in the back of our heard throughout the process” (ID2), “…made it easier to organise group meetings” (ID5), “…necessary to keep everyone on track” (ID8). These indicate that even though the reason these sessions were made compulsory was to ensure everyone did the training, the students found them important for ‘ensuring’ in-person meetings (Supplementary Material 5C).
Positively, the reasons given for why the reflection activity was useful [“Team reflection gave chance for people who were lacking behind to pull their weight” (ID5), “Team reflection allowed us to see where we stood and what we need to work on still” (ID2; Supplementary Material 5C)] – are the goals that the activity was designed to meet. One student commented that Team Training Session 3 (reflection activity) “came too early for our group” (ID7) – however the tasks described actually refer to the fourth session (discussing contributions). This confusion possibly came about because they were reminded during the third session that they would be discussing contributions in the final session.
A few students also commented on sessions they felt were less useful – in particular negotiation (Team Training Session 2): “The negotiation session I found to have its heart in the right place but didn’t feel very effective. I think it was because we didn’t always believe the arguments we were putting forward” (ID10), “our team worked well together so didn’t need negotiation session or reflection” (ID11). In future additional tasks (for example getting the students to think about something they may have disagreed on in the assessment and discuss how they came to a solution) may help widen the benefit of that session in particular. However, a third of the respondents still felt the session was useful (Figure 6A).
For comparison to our previous research (Rasmussen et al., 2011) we used the same codes for open responses to what they would do differently in their next team experience (Supplementary Material 5D). All the responses fell within these categories with 8 references to behaviours around group organisation such as “Add each other on social media” (ID4), “Always set small goals and keep the team updated” (ID6), “Plan more and start earlier on” (ID12). Workload division, ways to approach tasks and problems; and personality traits were also mentioned – mostly in the context of the first Team Training Session. For example: “Discuss early the strengths and weaknesses of the team members, and the expectations of how the team and the members will perform both alone and together.” (ID7); “Division of labour earlier on” (ID8); “be organised from the start about delegating work to team members (ID11; Supplementary Table 5D). Of particular note was a comment about personal behaviour which demonstrates a very mature attitude “Check-up quietly with other group member just to see if they are doing okay or if they need support with the workload” (ID1). This behaviour is mentioned in the first and third Team Training Sessions, however the COVID-19 situation made this a necessary behaviour in several groups and highlighted how problems can be dissolved before there is friction with an informal friendly (non-task-related) chat.
When asked about which features of Microsoft Teams the students used the most, unsurprisingly uploading files was used the most (they also had to upload the final video in this way). Perhaps more surprising was that only half the respondents said they used the Posts function (text chats that everyone can see) a lot or all the time (Figure 6B) and only 3 used the Microsoft Teams mobile app a lot or all the time (Figure 6B). This may be because 6 also mentioned they used WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger (Figure 6C).