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Abstract
Background: Collaborative group sessions in Nijmegen include 15 students who work all together on a group assignment. Sometimes, the group is split-up in three and every subgroup elaborates a part of the assignment. At the end, they peer-teach each other. It is believed that the split-up enhances participation and therefore learning gain.
Aims: To establish the effect of group size and structure of the assignment on the perceived participation, the satisfaction and learning gain of collaborative group sessions.
Methods: In this study, 27 groups of 15 students were equally divided into:
A-group: all 15 students working on the complete assignment.
B-group: subgroups of 5 students working on the complete assignment.
C-group: subgroups of 5 students working on a smaller part, and peer-teaching each other at the end of the group session.
All students took a pre-test, a post-test and a follow-up test and completed a questionnaire. Questionnaires were analyzed with a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and post hoc by multiple comparisons. Learning gain was analyzed using a repeated measures ANOVA.
Results: A group size effect is observed in favor of working in subgroups. Perceived participation of the students differs between A and B (p ≤ 0.001) and between A and C (p ≤ 0.001), but not between B and C. Also, an assignment effect is found in favor of the smaller assignment combined with peer-teaching. The students’ satisfaction differs between A and C (p ≤ 0.003) and between B and C (p ≤ 0.001), but not between A and B. The C-group also shows higher test results (p ≤ 0.043).
Conclusions: The students prefer smaller groups as well as smaller assignments including peer-teaching. A possible larger learning gain of this format needs to be re-investigated.