Improving team learning in systems design

A detailed statistical experiment to study the effect of the cognitive collaborative model (CCM) on learning has been designed. The subjects collaboratively solved an analysis and design problem in a graduate engineering course. In previous experiments, we showed the benefits of the CCM in improving engineering team performance and investigated the mechanisms that facilitate this improvement. The CCM is a six-stage cognitive model that takes into consideration the cognitive and social activities that occur during collaborative problem solving by facilitating problem formulation, solution planning, and system design tasks during collaboration. While facilitating collaboration within teams has long been seen as advantageous, the CCM model prescribes tactics to employ to ensure that collaboration is effective. In the first two experiments we showed the use of the CCM created a better understanding within the team of the problem they were tackling, and thus improved the project outcomes for that team. In the third experiment we sought to identify why those teams using the CCM performed better, hypothesizing that the CCM facilitates the forming of a shared, or team, mental model which has been identified, in the extant literature, as a necessary factor in high-performing teams. In this fourth experiment, randomly assigned teams of students were presented with one of four design problems. Half the teams were then exposed to the CCM. The effect on student learning was measured via a sequence of five individual assignments and exams as well as overall grades that incorporated the team projects. The results indicate that the CCM does indeed improve student learning.