6.3 Aine’s dilemma: group role play activity
Do you remember Aine’s dilemma from the previous chapter? This scenario activity can be done as an online group role play activity and is a good example of an online colloborative activity. In this section we detail the activity plan for this group role play, which you can try this out with your colleagues or students.
In this activity you are required to work with the team members in your group. Your task, as a group:
Choose your group response to Aine’s dilemma from the following options:
- Call the student and try to resolve the issues
- Pass this issue onto the course or programme manager
- Tell the other members of the group to get on with the project and ignore the other student
There are three possible role play scenario activities based on your group choice, these are detailed below:
- Call the student – Activity Role Play
In groups of four, form a team and allocate the following roles:
• Conor, the student
• Áine, the online educator
• Two observers (own names)
Team contract resource: Sample Team Contract
Role play: The activity requires you to act out what would occur in the call between Áine and Conor.
Observer 1 – Coordinator of the group. Obtain agreement of who is who within the team, arrange discussion of the team contract and get all to sign it, set and agree schedule of group work with the team.
Observer 2 – This person takes on a role as an observer of the process. This person should consider what she/he would say if she/he were Áine and create a tick box list. This tick box can used as part of the observation, i.e. is this what actually happened? In addition, the observer should make notes on how the group work element of the project works out, i.e. was the team contract adhered to?
Conor (Student) – You are aggrieved, you expected more support in the form of synchronous classes, and you are unhappy that the educator, Áine, pointed you to more ‘online resources’ and ‘rubrics’ when you complained. There is too much left to the students and Áine, the educator, does not teach you. She runs one tutorial every three weeks, which is far too few as far as you are concerned. For this discussion forum project, you want more instruction on how design factors are implemented in practice in order to be able to weigh them up. You have agreed to this call as you want to give voice to your concerns. You are under pressure at work, you need to get the certification associated with the course, and you have a particularly busy home life at the moment.
Áine (Educator) – Áine hasn’t come across this situation before, students are usually happy once they receive a response to their complaints, and they like getting extra resources. Áine is not really sure what this student’s problem is. Áine is very unhappy that this seems to have split the group, though she suspects that part of the negativity from other students is to do with their current personal workload. And most of the other students seem to be g