Group collaboration

Dear Student, We are currently conducting research on online collaborative learning. We are interested in learners views towards the problems they have with online collaboration. Such information will be valuable for us to formulate collaborative learning advice to promote online collaboration and foster learners participation. Your participation in this questionnaire is very important. We would be very grateful if you could spare a few minutes to fill in the questionnaire. The data entered into the questionnaire will be completely confidential, and will not be revealed to anyone except the research team. The results of this research will be available in about four months. If you would like to be informed about the results, please email me (jenny@dcs.warwick.ac.uk). Thank you very much for your support. Jenny Liu Doctoral Researcher Department of Computer Science, University of Warwick Conventions Asynchronous learning tools in this questionnaire refer to web applications which students can take part in at any time for learning. Examples of this are forums (or online discussion boards), wikis and blogs. Synchronous learning tools refer to web applications requiring that participants all meet at the same time to learn. For example, text and voice chat, instant messaging (such as MSN) and videoconferencing.

Part 1: Participants Background We would like to know a small amount of information about you. This is to enable us to see if there is any correlation between learners' backgrounds and their behaviour when they collaborate in groups.

1. What is your age

2. Gender:

3. Your Subject:

Undergraduate

Masters Student

Doctoral Student

Non-degree Student

Other, please specify in the following box

Other (education background):

5. Ethnic Origin:

Native English Speaker

Non-Native English Speaker

7. Which university are you studying at (If you prefer not to say please leave this blank)

8. Have you ever used asynchronous learning tools (e.g. forums, wikis, and blogs) when working on a group project?

Forums

Wikis

Blogs

I’ve never used any tools like this

Other, please fill in the following box

Other tools you have used:

Part 2: Participants Experiences Please think of your most recently completed group project.

By the instructor

By the students themselves

By a software tool but assigned manually by the instructor

By a software tool and assigned randomly

By a software tool and assigned using other methods

Other, please fill in the following box

The method was used for forming the groups:

10. How many members were there in your group

11. How many male students were there in your group

12. How many female students were there in your group

Here are seven scenarios of online collaboration or face-to-face collaboration. You might have experienced some or all of the situations. For each one, if you have experienced it, please select the reasons that (in your opinion) were most likely to describe why the situation arose. If you have never experienced a particular scenario, please select the option This never happened to me. If you have never used any asynchronous learning tools to complete group work skip to question 16.

13. Your group was given a topic for writing a paper. All the members in your group could post in an asynchronous learning tool to discuss the topic. You have made a post irrelevant to the learning topic. Which of the following most likely describes the reasons why you made the post?

I misunderstood the topic.

I posted the messages in the wrong place.

I used the forum to send personal messages to group members.

This never happened to me.

Other, please fill in the following box

Other reasons (scenario 1):

14. Your group was assigned a piece of work to be completed in an asynchronous learning tool. One of your group members made a post that contained several grammatical and/or spelling errors and was difficult to understand. Which of the following factors most likely caused this?

His or her English was poor.

He or she thought these errors would not affect the final assignment scores.

He or she was careless.

He or she used text speak.

He or she did not have much time to finish the assignment.

This never happened to me.

Other, please fill in the following box

Other factors (scenario 2):

15. You havent contributed much during online discussions. Which of the following factors that most likely inhibited you from communicating with other group members during these discussions?

I was too shy to be involved in the communication.

I disagreed with others on the discussion topic.

I have done my part of the work, no need to communicate with others.

I was too lazy.

I did not have enough time.

This never happened to me.

Other, please fill in the following box

Other factors (scenario 3):

16. All the members in your group were chasing the deadline set for the group work. There were no specific roles assigned to each member, but all members needed to complete the work together. However, one member was negligent in meeting the deadlines. Which of the following factors were most likely to have caused this?

He or she forgot the deadline.

He or she did not wish to do the work.

He or she did not understand what to do.

He or she was lazy.

He or she left the task until the last minute, when it was too late.

He or she did not like to work together with other group members.

He or she did not have the ability to work with others to improve the final product.

This never happened to me.

Other, please fill in the following box

Other factors (scenario 4):

17. Your group was assigned a group project. Each member in your group was assigned an individual role to complete the project. However, one member in your group did not complete his or her assigned work. Which of the following factors were most likely to have caused this?

He or she forgot the deadline.

He or she did not wish to do the work.

He or she did not understand what to do.

He or she was lazy.

He or she left the task until the last minute, when it was too late.

He or she did not like to work together with other group members.

He or she did not have the ability to work with others to contribute to the final product.

This never happened to me.

Other, please fill in the following box

Other factors (scenario 5):

18. The members in your group had given little feedback to each other about each others tasks. Which of the following factors do you think were most likely to have caused this?

They did not like to communicate with each other.

There were differences in culture which made members of the group uncomfortable giving each other feedback.

Differences in language made communication difficult.

The group members were too lazy.

They did not understand the task sufficiently.

The members delivered at the last minute leaving no time to give feedback.

This never happened to me.

Other, please fill in the following box

Other factors (scenario 6):

19. One of the members in your group had made most of the decisions in your group without being challenged by other members of the group. Which of the following reasons do you think contributed to this?

This person was the strongest academically.

Other members of the group did not like to argue.

Other members of the group did not like to share their opinions.

Other members were too lazy to challenge that person.

People were comfortable just doing what they were told to.

This never happened to me.

Other, please fill in the following box

Other reasons (scenario 7):

Thank you for your participation! This is the end of the questionnaire. Please click on "Send Form" to submit your responses.

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