In a small-group communication course, students participate in a semester-long project to observe an organization while applying many group communication principles, including conflict resolution, group dynamics, teambuilding, leadership, and diversity. In groups of five, the students select any organization, agency, or department on campus or in…

Courses: Introduction to Communication, Introduction to Interpersonal Communication, Family Communication, Small Group Communication, Communication and Listening. Objectives: By this end of this activity, students will be able to identify and practice supportive and defensive communication; understand a dialogic approach to conflict; and…

The purpose of this advisory is to assist academic staff members in avoiding conflict over ownership and authorship rights in collaborative academic work. When students, professors, librarians and other researchers work together in teams, they can create fundamental advances in knowledge. Unfortunately, these arrangements are also generating…

A technique used in college instruction to improve the contribution of individual members to a small working group of students is described. The approach addresses two common problems: (1) resolution of conflicts and (2) dealing with nonperforming group members. Students interview prospective partners and form their own groups, then report on the…

These lesson plans describe some of the basic conflict resolution lessons developed and used over the past years. The collection focuses on seven communication skills, sequenced from skills and activities that generally require the least amount of trust to those that require more. The skills identified include: (1) attention; (2) observation; (3)…

Whenever educators gather to achieve a common goal, every participant should arrive with a sense of purpose and leave with a feeling of accomplishment. This book explains how to make meetings more efficient and effective. It outlines: (1) the correlation between excellent meetings and excellent results; (2) how to plan, open, conduct, and follow…

This facilitators' handbook is intended primarily for use in workshops for parents and teachers involved in cooperative preschools. The handbook provides practical resources for anyone working in a group setting, and is designed with the aim of developing learners' skills in leadership and group activities. After introductory information, chapter…

The use of neutrals in higher education collective bargaining is considered, with specific reference to a pilot project in which a neutral worked for over a year with the administration and faculty union at a two-year public community college. Eighteen propositions that may promote the creative use of third parties are offered, including the…

Intended for researchers and teachers of the small group process, decision making, and negotiation, this paper offers a review and critique of J. Habermas's theory of universal pragmatics. The first section of this paper retraces Habermas's theory, which seeks to free social action from false consciousness (that is, political ideologies) that…

This curriculum guide is focused on helping secondary students with and without disabilities gain knowledge and skills that will allow them to increase their ability to achieve their goals in environments with varying levels of receptivity to the concept of self-determination. The curriculum is designed to be delivered over the course of one…

Innovations in the teaching and learning strategies used in an organizational-behavior course developed for the business school of Curtin University of Technology (Australia) are detailed. Faculty (n=18) and students (n=800) involved in the course-development process were organized into semi-autonomous study groups and learned to cope with group…

Social skills needed for effective collaborative learning by college students are discussed, including skills in interpersonal interaction, group building and management, inquiry, conflict resolution, and synthesis and presentation. Five instructional strategies to enhance students' collaborative skills are described: identification,…

This manual presents the trainee's workbook and the trainer's guidelines for the first of six modules in a teacher inservice series developed to promote the unified effort of both regular and special education personnel in understanding and applying nationally recognized practices to implement fully inclusive education for students with diverse…

This document is designed to help facilitators with the formation and development of effective teams of people who have no previous history as a team and no training in group processes. Part 1 provides a narrative explanation of the stages of group development (investing in membership, forming attachments to subgroups, confronting/debating issues,…

Based on the belief that discipline problems reflect poor relationships and must be resolved in a social context, this book provides teachers with a framework which enables them to relate more effectively with students. Following a preface, the volume is organized into 11 chapters: (1) "A New Tradition in Classroom Management"; (2)…