Learning by facilitating: A project-based interdisciplinary approach

Abstract

Teamwork skills are an important part of business school curriculum typically taught using project-based experiential methods. This paper presents best practices for teaching teamwork skills to Gen Z students using a project-based learning, peer mentoring approach. With experiential learning theory as a guide, an interdisciplinary process was developed between an introductory programming course and a capstone business project management course to improve experiential learning and overcome issues like the free-rider problem. The opinions and sentiments of peer mentors were examined using text analysis and sentiment analysis. Peer mentoring between two interdisciplinary courses was found to reduce the free-rider problem and was beneficial for both classes.

Keywords:

• Experiential learning theory
• Gen Z
• project-based learning
• project management
• sentiment analysis

Introduction

In recent decades, the nature of work has fundamentally changed, moving away from routine work toward an emphasis on project work requiring teamwork. Today, teamwork is a top skill in demand by employers (NACE, 2018). Even though employers place a high value on students who have the ability to work well in teams, students generally do not like to work in groups (Pearlstein, 2020). Most students despise group projects used to teach skills related to the ability to work well on teams (Halonen & Dunn, 2021). This negative sentiment toward group projects is even more pronounced in Gen Z, the current college-age students. In analyzing differences between Gen Z and millennials, a report by Ernst & Young found that while millennials were protected and validated by their parents, Gen Z was not protected by their Gen X parents who raised them to be independent (Merriman, 2015). Compared with millennials, independent-minded Gen Z students are less likely to enjoy the camaraderie of group projects and are especially concerned about the free-rider problem (Schlee, Eveland, & Harich, 2020). The free-rider problem, also known as social loafing, occurs when one or more members of the group do not do their fair share and has long been cited as one of the primary problems with group projects (Brooks & Ammons, 2003; Mello, 1993).

Gen Z views the instructor simply as a facilitator of learning (Magano et al., 2020). Their learning preference is experiential and they prefer learning by exploring rather than passive learning through lectures (Mahesh, Bhat, & Suresh, 2021; Riley & Nicewicz, 2022).

Theoretical foundation

Experiential learning refers to learning from experience or learning by doing. Kolb and Kolb (2005) Experiential learning theory (ELT) defines experiential learning as “the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of experience” (p. 194). ELT is rooted in constructivism. Constructivism empowers individuals to develop and construct their own knowledge (Bakan & Bakan, 2018). Empowering the individual is an approach well suited for Gen Z students.

A more specific definition of experiential learning that fits with business education is learning by allowing students to apply knowledge to real-world problems (Wurdinger & Carlson, 2011). An increased realization of the importance of experiential learning in business schools can be seen by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) 2020 Curriculum standard 4.3 requiring “school provides a portfolio of experiential learning opportunities.”

Project-based learning (PBL)

PBL is an experiential learning tool that involves students learning collaboratively in small groups while working through meaningful problems (Schmidt, 1983). Yazici (2020) identifies five things PBL helps students in developing: (a) a knowledge base, (b) effective collaboration skills, (c) problem-solving skills, (d) motivation to learn, and (e) self-directed learning skills.

This kind of small group collaborative learning can make programming more engaging and fun (Teague & Roe, 2008). Because PBL is a self-directed technique, it aligns with Gen Z’s independent style. However, a common problem with group assignments is that they are often assigned without sufficient directions (Natoli, Jackling, & Seelanatha, 2014). Often, instruction on how to work in groups receives even less attention from faculty (Pimmel, 2003). Instructors expect students to work well in groups, but they do not usually offer guidance. Commonly, a group project involves an assignment that conveys the main goals of the project, followed by students picking their own groups and concluding with a final report or presentation.

In this study, peer mentoring was combined with PBL, at first unsuccessfully, to provide structure and address these problems. The goal was not to have student mentors teaching lower-level students. Rather, the goal was to use peer mentors to create an environment conducive to learning for both mentors and their mentees. These peer mentoring goals fit with the Yomtov, Plunkett, Efrat, and Marin (2015) process-focused definition of peer mentoring whereby a mentor “provides guidance, support, and practical advice to a mentee who is close in age and shares common characteristics or experiences” (p. 2). The purpose of peer mentoring is not to teach or do the work. Rather, the purpose is to facilitate or coordinate learning. Cano, Lidon, Rebollar, Roman, and Saenz (2006) found that groups headed by a “coordinator” experienced increased levels of success and decreased levels of failure.

The use of experiential tools like group projects and peer mentors do not guarantee that experiential learning will take place. There needs to be a focus on process and theory, specifically ELT. For example, simply assigning senior-level peers to work with first-year students might result in those seniors playing the traditional role of teacher or doing all the work without any learning taking place. These were some of the problems that occurred in this study when volunteer peer mentors were used.

The benefits of PBL and peer mentoring are well known. The question in this study is about implementation. What process changes can be made to encourage experiential learning with these tools?

In this study, we examined changes made to curriculum at a small private university where several computer-related degrees were offered, including Computer Science (CS), Digital Entertainment Technology (DET), Information Systems (IS), and Information Technology (IT). The interdisciplinary curriculum described in this paper did not occur overnight. It was an iterative cycle of improvements made over the course of four years. The timeline of these cycles is described next to provide some background. This is followed by a description of the process changes made and their implementation.

Background

At the beginning of their coursework at the university, all students majoring in a computer-related degree take a common Introductory Programming (IP) course. IP is typically taught using programming assignments where students write code, make mistakes, and correct those mistakes. This is an iterative, individual learning process that allows the students to learn by solving errors on their own. One problem with IP is that first-year programming students are easily overwhelmed and frustrated because correcting mistakes is a talent learned through experience, a talent they are initially lacking. Malik and Coldwell-Nielson (2017) describe another common IP problem, which is that many different skill sets have to be developed simultaneously. This explains the traditionally high dropout and failure rates suffered by IP classes in general (Watson & Li, 2014; Zingaro & Porter, 2014).

Project management (PM) is a senior-level business course required for all IS majors as a capstone experience. Like the lower-level IP class, the PM class had been employing experiential techniques for a better and more realistic learning experience. Real client projects were the experiential learning technique employed. Teams of PM students would work on real client projects culminating in an end-of-semester project report and presentation.

During the Fall 2014 semester, a game-making team project was incorporated into the IP class. This was favorably received, but it did not reduce student frustration as hoped. It had been expected that the team project would encourage collaborative learning and help prevent individuals from falling behind. Instead, free-rider problems prevailed, which resulted in high levels of frustration and unacceptably low levels of learning. Although some of the students not doing the work were purposeful slackers, many were simply frustrated and unguided. Students who lacked programming experience were easily frustrated because they felt unprepared for the project. More experienced students were frustrated because they did the majority of the work compared to less experienced teammates. When groups have high levels of diversity with respect to skills, ability, and knowledge, the free-rider problem becomes more pronounced (Sanz-Martínez, Er, Martínez-Monés, Dimitriadis, & Bote-Lorenzo, 2019).

In Fall 2015, the instructors decided that the students needed additional guidance beyond what the instructors could provide for such a large class size. As a result, one first-year student per team was chosen to be team leader. This solution did not improve student frustration or outcomes. First-year students lack the experience and knowledge to be effective team leaders.

By the Fall 2016 semester, the instructors decided that more advanced students would be better team leaders for the first-year teams. Senior students from CS, DET, IS, and IT were encouraged to become volunteer mentors and work with the first-year students in an attempt to reduce frustration and keep the teams on track throughout the semester. Several problems resulted from this solution. The senior volunteer mentors had an unequal knowledge of PM and so the teams with good leaders excelled, while the teams with poor leaders were no better than before. Only the IS majors had management experience and only some of them had taken the PM class. Some volunteers said they did not feel like they were truly empowered to manage the projects and only made suggestions instead of stepping in and being an effective team leader. The volunteer mentors were also not motivated because they were not receiving any grades for their efforts. The seniors were worried about graduating, so finding time to meet with their first-year teams on top of their normal coursework was difficult. The volunteers wanted to help, but they did not know how to help effectively. They often took the strain off the teams by doing the work for the first-year students because it was quicker, but that also meant the first-year students learned less. Instructors felt that the first-year students were being undermined in their efforts.

Meanwhile, there were problems with the senior-level PM course, which was the capstone class for IS business majors. Like the IP course, coordinating meeting times was a major problem as was the free-rider problem. Pollard’s (2012) study of client projects in PM classes found that the biggest time management problem was in coordinating and finding time for weekly meetings. Finally, a surprising problem with the real client projects was their lack of realism. The teams of senior PM students had to choose one person to play the role of project manager while the others had to play the role of team members. The situation was demotivating and unrealistic and can be neatly described as too many captains with no crew. The IP class featured the exact opposite problem of too much crew and no captain.

Interdisciplinary implementation

In Fall 2017, the instructors of the IP class decided to combine efforts with the instructor of the capstone PM class. In the IP class, the semester project did not change. The project specified that teams had to plan, design, and code a simple video game. The teams were free to choose the type and style of gaming app they would work on throughout the semester. At the end of the semester, each team participated in a student showcase. At the showcase, teams demonstrated their games to guests (students, faculty, and staff), who were able to play the games and ask questions about the projects.

What changed was the interdisciplinary composition of the teams. The IP class provided teams of inexperienced students with diverse majors in CS, DET, IT, and IS. The capstone PM class provided team leaders working as project managers. Because the IP class was approximately four times the size of the capstone course, it was a simple exercise to make project teams consisting of one PM student with four or five IP students. There were several benefits to this arrangement for the PM students. Instead of managing a team with equivalent rank and knowledge to the team leader, the teams of first-year students had less knowledge and experience. This provided the PM students with a more realistic experience. The first-year students suffered from interpersonal team problems, which provided an opportunity for team leaders to practice handling these issues and diffusing problems.

To guarantee time for teams to meet each week, the IP and PM classes were scheduled on the same days at the same time down the hall from each other. Thursdays were devoted to team meetings, and grade points were assigned for attendance. Tuesdays were devoted to learning the skills that would allow students to be successful in their teams. In the IP class, this involved teaching basic coding and game design techniques. The PM class had already been organized according to the phases of PM. PM students learned PM tools and methods like the project charter, work breakdown structure (WBS), and project scheduling. These tools and methods were learned and applied in sync with the IP class as the project progressed through the phases of initiating, planning, executing, controlling, and closing. In the Tuesday PM class for instance, WBS concepts for assigning responsibility and managing projects were taught via reading, lecture, and an individual WBS assignment. This was followed by PM students meeting with their teams on Thursday, creating a WBS for their team, and turning in that WBS as a second graded WBS assignment. If IP team members got stuck or needed help with code, PM students were encouraged to help as a tutor would. However, throughout the course, PM students were reminded that their primary task was to manage the teams as facilitators, not do the work.

Methodology

The interdisciplinary team project was designed to encourage experiential learning and solve a number of problems, including the free-rider problem. The primary experiential learning methods employed were PBL and peer mentoring. Data were obtained from the collection of end-of-semester reflective essay papers written by the senior PM students who led the IP teams. There were 27 papers. Personally identifying information was removed, and approval to use the data was obtained from the university’s Institutional Review Board. These papers were analyzed through sentiment analysis (SA) and text analysis. SA was used to evaluate general attitudes. Then, text analysis was used to assess the implementation success of interdisciplinary PBL and peer mentoring as well as the free-rider problem.

In using data from assignments, one major concern was addressing response bias. In their end-of-semester reflective papers, all students were asked to include problems they experienced with their teams. The worry was that students would only give positive feedback to please the instructor and earn a better grade. To overcome this problem, all responses were given a completion grade of 100%. Response bias was also addressed through assignment instructions, both written and oral. Instructions stressed that addressing problems was a big part of a project manager’s job, and negative experiences had as much learning potential as positive experiences. Previous research has found that end-of-semester reflection papers yield information that is greater and richer than course evaluation surveys (Deggs & Weaver, 2009; YuekMing & Manaf, 2014). Our experience was consistent with this, as the reflective papers provided more information than course evaluations.

SA

SA is a type of machine learning tool called natural language processing typically used to determine whether data are tagged positive, negative, or neutral. Sentiments extracted by SA from raw text involve complex human emotions that can occur consciously or subconsciously. A generally available pre-trained SA model from MonkeyLearn was used. To train a model, Garreta (2022) recommends using at least 500 samples per tag. The dataset in this study included 27 responses consisting of 310 sentences total. A pre-trained model using three tags (positive, negative, and neutral) was used because of the small dataset involved. Use of an automated tool removes the human factor. This allows consistent criteria to be applied, which produces consistent results each time. In their study assessing the accuracy of MonkeyLearn’s pre-trained SA model, Contreras, Wilkinson, Alterman, and Hervás (2022) reported an overall accuracy rate of 63% and a 37% misclassification rate which is comparable to manual, human-rated models. They found MonkeyLearn’s pre-trained SA sufficient for preliminary assessments of sentiment. Results of SA are given in Table 1 and Figure 1.

Figure 1. Sentiment analysis count of each polarity.

Table 1. Essay-level sentiment analysis polarities (n = 27).

Classification	Essays	Confidence level
Positive	21	0.9598
Negative	5	0.7668
Neutral	1	0.733

In reading through the reflection papers, only one stood out as completely negative. Several responses discussed problems that were overcome, and many were a mix of both positive and negative aspects of the experience. This likely explains the lower confidence level reported for responses coded as negative. SA could be performed at the sentence level for more precision, but in this study general sentiment was assessed.

Text analysis

The first task in text analysis is coding the text. Coding involves combining and differentiating the corpus of data into categories so that meaning can be extracted (Miles & Huberman, 1994). This is traditionally done manually (Berg & Lune, 2011). Problems with manual coding include cost, inability to handle large datasets, and threats to validity and reliability from subjective human involvement (Debortoli, Müller, Junglas, & Vom Brocke, 2016; Urquhart, 2001).

Text analysis coding techniques, whether manual or automated, use either a bottom-up or top-down approach. A bottom-up approach allows the data to suggest codes which are called topics, regardless of theory (Debortoli et al., 2016; Urquhart, 2001). A top-down approach allows the researcher to determine the topics a priori based on the literature or a theory being tested.

In this study a manual, top-down text analysis approach was employed using NVivo 12 software for thematic analysis. Cruzes, Dybå, Runeson, and Höst (2014) proposed several steps for using NVivo 12 software for thematic analysis. First, pertinent data were extracted. This involved cleaning the data by removing header-type information such as the course name, assignment name, date, and any identifying student or instructor information. Next, the researchers coded all 27 responses. Then, the three higher-level themes were identified. The first two higher-level topics or themes were based on the ELT techniques used in this study for improving student learning, namely interdisciplinary project-based learning (IPBL) and peer mentoring. The third higher-level theme, the free-rider problem, came from the relevant literature and prior experience in the classes. Subthemes emerged as the data were analyzed. The three higher-level themes and their related subthemes are shown in Table 2.

Table 2. Distribution of thematic codes by theme and subtheme.

Theme	How many mentioned it
Interdisciplinary project-based learning
• Combining the classes was a good idea	15
• Both courses benefited	12
• Class structure was unique	11
• Combining classes should be a tradition	8
Peer mentoring
• Realistic management experience	8
• Mentoring was beneficial	14
• Fun experience	7
• Improved team communication	3
Free-rider problem
• Free-rider problems were fixed	10
• Free-rider problems were partially fixed	1
• Free-rider problems occurred and were not fixed	1

No statistical checks exist for checking reliability and validity in qualitative research using open-ended responses. However, there are ways to increase coding credibility. One method to improve credibility involves having more than one researcher coding results and analyzing data (Côté & Turgeon, 2005; Nowell, Norris, White, & Moules, 2017; Sutton & Austin, 2015). This method was applied in the current study. Also, validity can be increased using software tools to reduce researcher bias and uphold rigor (Cruzes et al., 2014; Woods, Macklin, & Lewis, 2016). For this, NVivo 12 software was used for the manual text analysis and a pre-trained model was used for SA. Additionally, extracts straight from the narratives can be embedded in the study to persuade the reader that the analysis is valid (Braun & Clarke, 2006).

The following are some comments taken from the student responses:

• Comment 1: Sure, we did some administrative stuff by smoothing out the workloads between team members, reinforced the deadlines, and facilitated communications among the team, and that certainly helped the project along, but these regular meetings forced our team to make progress each and every week and they were absolutely beaming at their own accomplishments. We showed pride and encouragement, which kept the cycle going and going. This led to far more effort from the entire team than I’ve seen in any group project ever.

• Comment 2: My perception is that our team had a very positive experience overall, especially compared to other group projects where one person usually ends up doing all of the work. Having project managers allowed for an unbiased group of people to assign work tasks which kept things organized and kept people responsible for their tasks.

• Comment 3: I believe the development side had a really good time, whereas the managers did not have as well of a time, but I also believe everyone got a learning experience out of it.

• Comment 4: I even had one of the group members approach me in confidence telling me they didn’t feel like the other members have been pulling their weight. So, I stepped in and arranged for the group to meet that following weekend, so they could start merging together, and from what I gathered that next week, it seemed to have an effect.

• Comment 5: It was beneficial for the freshman group to go through this experience because it was a good way for them to have direction in their project and for them to be guided toward resources in which they can get help for whenever they get stuck. This project was beneficial to the seniors because it gave us real experience in how it is to manage a team, and it was a little taste of what we could possibly do in the future. This experience has provided a way for real-world experience.

• Comment 6: At first, I think the upperclassmen and lowerclassmen had to get use[d] to each other at the beginning of the project. But once we broke the ice with everyone involved, we started to work very well together as a team. By the end of the project, I would say this was one of the best and most rewarding group projects to be a part of.

• Comment 7: [H]aving the upperclassmen monitor the lowerclassmen in a collaborative style turned out to work very well in my opinion.

• Comment 8: We acted a mentors and guides for people who were more than willing to receive the help. The overall idea was a huge success, and I would urge everyone to push for this sort of collaboration in the future.

Discussion

The high ratio of positive sentiment as well as positive feedback indicates this interdisciplinary approach to IPBL and peer mentoring was successful. Similarly, Zeitun, Abdulqader, and Alshare (2013) found a strong correlation between group performance and team satisfaction.

The top three subthemes mentioned the most are (1) combining the classes was a good idea (IPBL theme), (2) mentoring was beneficial (peer mentoring theme), and (3) free-rider problems were fixed (free-rider problem theme).

Only 12 students mentioned issues with the free-rider problem. Of the 12 students, 10 reported that they were able to resolve the free-rider problem while 1 student only partially resolved the problem. One student reported a free-rider problem that was unable to be resolved. Although we cannot definitively rule out free-rider problems from the other 15 responses, it is safe to say that they either did not experience issues with free-riders or the problem was so minimal it was not raised in the reflection paper. This represents an improvement from previous semesters where the free-rider problem was observed to be a much more widespread problem.

Conclusion

In this study, connections were made between ELT and academic work to make curriculum changes, with the ultimate goal of improving the learning experience. Those improvements were tested using SA and text analysis to analyze end-of-semester reflection papers.

By themselves, experiential learning tools are powerful tools with well-known benefits. Too often, these tools are the focus and the underlying processes and strategies are neglected. We present a situation where experiential learning was falling short despite the use of multiple experiential learning tools including PBL, client projects, game-making, and peer mentoring. With ELT as a guide for strategy, the learning processes were redesigned. Responses were overwhelmingly positive. One of the positive aspects about PBL is that it is a self-directed experiential learning technique. It allows individual perspectives to be brought together in addressing a problem, resulting in collaborative learning. We found that the introduction of structure and guidance through peer mentoring between two interdisciplinary courses was especially beneficial for both classes and the result was enhanced collaborative learning.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).