Before and After: Team Development in Virtual and In-Person Transfer Student Engineering Design Teams

Natalie Van Tyne

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Conference: 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Minneapolis, MN
Publication Date: August 23, 2022
Start Date: June 26, 2022
End Date: June 29, 2022
Conference Session: First-Year Programs Division Technical Session 3: Online Learning and the Impact of COVID-19
Page Count: 15
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--41313
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/41313
Download Count: 337

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Paper Authors

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Natalie Van Tyne Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

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Natalie Van Tyne is an Associate Professor of Practice in the Department of Engineering Education at Virginia Tech, having joined in 2015. Her research interests include guided practice in the use of reflection to improve student learning, the relationship between reflection and critical thinking, pedagogies for engineering ethics education, and guided practice in effective teamwork. She has a background in chemical engineering, environmental engineering, and business administration. Prior to her career with Virginia Tech, she worked in industry for 31 years, and joined the Colorado School of Mines faculty in 2002. She is also a registered Professional Engineer in Colorado, and holds a PhD in Engineering Education.

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Abstract

This Evidence-Based Practice paper will describe the similarities and differences in team development among first-year engineering design teams containing transfer students in the Fall 2020 and Fall 2021 semesters. The Fall 2020 design course was delivered online, due to the conditions surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic that prevented course delivery in person. By Fall 2021, COVID-19 conditions had improved to the extent that the design course could be delivered in person. These two different course environments were expected to produce different experiences in team development between the two cohorts. While this study involves only transfer students, based on currently available data, a similar study could be conducted after the Spring 2021 semester with first-year students who began college at their current institution.

My research question is:

• How do team development experiences differ under virtual and in-person conditions, respectively and in comparison?

The conceptual framework for this inquiry is based on the Tuckman model of team development. This model consists of four stages that Tuckman and others have demonstrated that teams exhibit during their duration: Forming, Storming, Norming and Performing. This model originated with adult teams in the workplace, but is equally applicable to non-self-selected engineering student design teams. Tuckman and others also assumed that a successful team progresses through all four stages during its duration.

In the Forming and Storming stages, team members tend to view themselves as individuals rather than as part of a cohesive unit. As they transition to the Norming stage, they recognize and accept the premise that the team can accomplish more together than they would if each acted in isolation. Even if a team forms a contract or charter during the Forming stage, which states how they will operate as a team, the ways in which they actually operate tend to become apparent during Norming. By the time that a team reaches the Performing stage, each member has a clear vision of what the team does and can do, and uses the relationships among team members to accomplish tasks more or less efficiently.

The five- or six-member student design teams were assigned through a skills and personality assessment at the beginning of the fifteen-week semester, using the CATME® team formation survey. The CATME results were checked against the students’ self-reported data about their current skills in writing, speaking, and engineering graphics before the students were formally assigned to their teams.

Research methods followed an explanatory sequential design, beginning with a survey based on the Tuckman model for team development, followed by emergent coding of selected sources of evidence about team performance, such as the following:

• a team contract, developed by the team during Week 4 of the semester; • a CATME® peer review, administered online during Weeks 7 and 8; • team-based commentary about the results of the team development survey, noting similarities and differences among team members’ results, as part of a project and team status update submitted during Week 12; • team-based commentary about additional progress toward team development since Week 12, as part of the final project and team status update submitted during Week 15, and • a final CATME® peer review, administered during Weeks 14 and 15.

By Week 12, the members of many teams in both cohorts were in strong agreement about their team’s development between the Norming and Performing stages of the Tuckman model. This is a positive outcome, given that the teams had been operating for nine weeks and had only three weeks remaining to complete the design project and the course. However, extensive response bias indicated that certain online and in-person teams may have been viewing their team’s development less realistically because they were required to report on similarities and differences among team members’ survey results as part of a homework assignment. Certain survey questions were also reported to have been misinterpreted by team members. However, on a more positive note, both types of teams also reported evidence of four attributes of successful teams from recent literature about team dynamics during the COVID-19 pandemic: collective efficacy, psychological safety, resilience, individual performance, and communication.

Citation
Format

Van Tyne, N. (2022, August), Before and After: Team Development in Virtual and In-Person Transfer Student Engineering Design Teams Paper presented at 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Minneapolis, MN. 10.18260/1-2--41313

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - This Evidence-Based Practice paper will describe the similarities and differences in team development among first-year engineering design teams containing transfer students in the Fall 2020 and Fall 2021 semesters. The Fall 2020 design course was delivered online, due to the conditions surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic that prevented course delivery in person. By Fall 2021, COVID-19 conditions had improved to the extent that the design course could be delivered in person.  These two different course environments were expected to produce different experiences in team development between the two cohorts. While this study involves only transfer students, based on currently available data, a similar study could be conducted after the Spring 2021 semester with first-year students who began college at their current institution. 

My research question is:

•	How do team development experiences differ under virtual and in-person conditions, respectively and in comparison? 

The conceptual framework for this inquiry is based on the Tuckman model of team development. This model consists of four stages that Tuckman and others have demonstrated that teams exhibit during their duration: Forming, Storming, Norming and Performing. This model originated with adult teams in the workplace, but is equally applicable to non-self-selected engineering student design teams. Tuckman and others also assumed that a successful team progresses through all four stages during its duration.

In the Forming and Storming stages, team members tend to view themselves as individuals rather than as part of a cohesive unit. As they transition to the Norming stage, they recognize and accept the premise that the team can accomplish more together than they would if each acted in isolation.  Even if a team forms a contract or charter during the Forming stage, which states how they will operate as a team, the ways in which they actually operate tend to become apparent during Norming. By the time that a team reaches the Performing stage, each member has a clear vision of what the team does and can do, and uses the relationships among team members to accomplish tasks more or less efficiently. 

The five- or six-member student design teams were assigned through a skills and personality assessment at the beginning of the fifteen-week semester, using the CATME® team formation survey. The CATME results were checked against the students’ self-reported data about their current skills in writing, speaking, and engineering graphics before the students were formally assigned to their teams.  

Research methods followed an explanatory sequential design, beginning with a survey based on the Tuckman model for team development, followed by emergent coding of selected sources of evidence about team performance, such as the following:

•	a team contract, developed by the team during Week 4 of the semester;
•	a CATME® peer review, administered online during Weeks 7 and 8;
•	team-based commentary about the results of the team development survey, noting similarities and differences among team members’ results, as part of a project and team status update submitted during Week 12;
•	team-based commentary about additional progress toward team development since Week 12, as part of the final project and team status update submitted during Week 15, and
•	a final CATME® peer review, administered during Weeks 14 and 15.

By Week 12, the members of many teams in both cohorts were in strong agreement about their team’s development between the Norming and Performing stages of the Tuckman model. This is a positive outcome, given that the teams had been operating for nine weeks and had only three weeks remaining to complete the design project and the course. However, extensive response bias indicated that certain online and in-person teams may have been viewing their team’s development less realistically because they were required to report on similarities and differences among team members’ survey results as part of a homework assignment. Certain survey questions were also reported to have been misinterpreted by team members. However, on a more positive note, both types of teams also reported evidence of four attributes of successful teams from recent literature about team dynamics during the COVID-19 pandemic: collective efficacy, psychological safety, resilience, individual performance, and communication. 

AU  - Natalie Van Tyne
CY  - Minneapolis, MN
DA  - 2022/08/23
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Before and After: Team Development in Virtual and In-Person Transfer Student Engineering Design Teams
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/41313
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--41313
ER  -