This is an enlightening post. Being a grad student in an Instructional Design and Technology program, as well as being a mostly online student, I found myself agreeing with many of the things that students say they do not want in an online environment.

I am currently a student at Walden University, and this past August, I finished my undergrad at a different university. I completed all of my classes online with the exception of one. One of the major complaints I had about this universities’ online environment was the amount of group work we were obligated to participate in. I completed 12 classes (I had a substantial amount of transfer credit), and there was group work in at least 8 of the courses I completed, often times several group projects in one class. I am an adult student; therefore, I was often more concerned about my grade than others in my group. I ended up doing the majority of the work on the group projects while my “teammates” sat back and got an easy “A”. It was extremely frustrating. Often times I was so irritated that I considered going back and taking traditional courses in hopes of avoiding group work. However, because I also work full-time, the online environment was more convenient. Fortunately, my classes at Walden have had 0 group work to this point.

While I believe that minimal group work can be a learning experience for a student, I also believe that too much group work often leaves one or two students doing the majority of the work while the others do minimal or nothing. While the student(s) putting forth an effort in a group are gaining new knowledge, the student(s) doing nothing are gaining just that…nothing.

As a student, and as a future ID, I think adding group work as an “add-on” to an assignment can be beneficial, but I will be steering clear of incorporating too much group work into curriculum.

Thanks for the comment. In your situation, simulation may very well be the most appropriate approach. I think you’ve hit the nail on the head in that whatever you do in your courses must be engaging. I believe the resistance we may be experiencing to interactivity is more a result of such activities in many cases being implemented and overused without an evident purpose and clearly explicable connection to the expected outcomes of a course. If your ERP implementation simulations are the most clear path for students to traverse in the course to reach the designed outcome – use them. And let me know how it goes.

Thanks,
Sherry