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Virtual Facilitation and Observational Learning of Team Skills
Dr Ray Luechtefeld
Assistant Professor
University of Missouri– Rolla, Missouri, U.S.A
Introduction
The need to develop effective, easily disseminated approaches to improving team skills is urgent and
pervasive. Learning these skills requires effective education. A manager who wants a team task done well
cannot simply call some people together, toss them a task, and hope for the best. The same could be said
for educators. This presents a problem for many faculty members. Instructors often give team projects in
an effort to help students learn effective teamwork skills, but this practice alone does not improve the
ability to manage team dynamics. Even though they may feel that it is important for students to learn
effective team skills and may incorporate student teams in projects as part of their courses, when faced
with a large number of topics they need to convey to students, instructors may feel that team training
should occur elsewhere in the curriculum.
The problem is compounded in a distance setting. While the ability to work together is a valuable, and
even essential, skill, isolation and disconnectedness may make the difficult task of effective teaming
nearly impossible. Without the face-to-face interaction of on-campus courses, instructors may have
difficulty identifying and assisting students lacking these skills.
The behaviorist approach of B.F. Skinner (1968) is often used to help students learn new skills. In fact, it
has in many ways dominated current methods of classroom management and instructional development.
Many users of this approach rely on extrinsic motivators to prod students learning. However, Skinnerian
behaviorism is a crude tool to teach students to manage the dynamic, ephemeral nature of team dynamics.
As an alternative, Bandura’s theory (1961) of observational learning suggests that students might be able
to acquire skills by observing and imitating others, driven by intrinsic motivation. This paper briefly
contrasts Skinner’s and Bandura’s theories of learning / behavioral change, addresses the difficulties of
applying Skinnerian methods to learning team skills via distance education, and illustrates how
observational learning might be used to help students learn team communication skills at a distance
through the use of a “virtual facilitator”.
Skinner’s Theory of Operant Conditioning
Skinner’s (1954) theory of operant conditioning proposes that changes in behavior are a result of
environmental stimuli. Two important principles underlie operant conditioning: reinforcement and
shaping.
Behaviors that are reinforced (rewarded), such as receiving praise or an “A” for solving a math problem,
are more likely to be repeated. While reinforcers, according to Skinner’s theory, are anything that
strengthens the desired response (including intrinsic reinforcers such as feelings of accomplishment or
satisfaction), it can be argued that externally imposed reinforcers are more commonly imposed in a
classroom because they provide a reliable means of guiding student learning.
Skinner suggested that instructors use “shaping” to shift students’ behaviors. Responses are “shaped”
toward a desired response by presenting information in small steps and rewarding behaviors that are close
to what is desired.
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23rd Annual Conference on Distance Teaching & Learning
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Skinner’s approach has come to dominate contemporary classroom management and instructional
development as instructors atomise skills to their component parts and then reward the enactment of those
skills through A’s, praise, gold stars, etc. This approach relies more heavily on extrinsic motivators (i.e.,
externally imposed) than on intrinsic motivators like the joy of learning a new skill.
Applying Skinner’s techniques to help students learn team skills in a distance setting is particularly
problematic. When students in distance courses do interact with one another, it may be via phone or chat
room conversations that are not visible to the instructor. Without the ability to observe what is going on
in student teams, an instructor cannot shape or reward desired behaviors. The sheer volume of interactive
behaviors can also present a barrier to employing operant conditioning. A class with fifteen or twenty
students working in small groups or teams can generate a great deal of dialogue. Even if these teams are
working in a chat space, it can be challenging to simply read all of the conversations, much less evaluate,
shape, and reward desired behaviors occurring in the conversations.
Given these obstacles, an alternative method of helping distance students acquire team skills is worth
considering.
Bandura’s Theory of Observational (Social) Learning
While Skinner’s theory of operant conditioning is relatively well known, Bandura’s theory of
observational learning is less familiar to many. Bandura (1971, 1986) noted that individuals may initiate
new behaviors through a process of observation and imitation. He described four conditions are part of
the process of acquiring new skills through observational learning.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Attention – Individuals notice a target behavior and pay attention to it.
Retention – To be able to enact the behavior, they must be able to remember what they
have paid attention to.
Reproduction – They must also have the ability to reproduce the behavior.
Motivation – Individuals must see the behavior as valuable in order to be motivated to
enact it.
Bandura’s theory shares a common theme of motivation with Skinner’s theory. However, one crucial
difference is that Bandura’s theory emphasizes self-regulation; that is, that individuals observe their
environment, evaluate their actions based on personal or societal standards, and then self-reward or selfpunish. Thus Bandura’s theory emphasizes intrinsic motivators, in contrast to Skinner’s, which has been
largely associated with extrinsic motivators.
Just as they learn many other skills, students can learn team skills through a process of observing a skilled
individual and modeling their actions after him or her. Again though, in a distance setting, this approach
is particularly difficult. The lack of direct interaction and exposure to specific target behaviors limits the
degree of observational learning that is possible.
However, there is evidence that students can learn facilitation skills from observing the actions of a
“virtual facilitator”, an expert dialogic system that models basic skills used by expert facilitators as they
intervene in team conversations.
Virtual Facilitation
The “virtual facilitator” (Luechtefeld & Watkins, 2005) is a patent-pending system that
automatically “listens” to team conversation and then intervenes into the conversation by asking questions
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or making comments, in much the same manner as an expert facilitator. If students are engaged in a
phone or face-to-face conversation, the system uses commercially available speech recognition software
in each student’s personal computer (also equipped with a headset microphone) to translate his or her
words to text. (If students are communicating through a chat room, this software is not needed.) Student
computers are connected either wirelessly or through the Internet and a transcript of the complete team
conversation is assembled. The system uses rules to scan the conversation for words or phrases that will
trigger interventions like those used by experts in team skills. When a rule is triggered an appropriate
question or statement is displayed on the screen of each users’ computer, (or, pending further
development, spoken aloud by the computer). The rules can be modified to emulate different team skills.
For example, sets of rules can be devised to help students learn to manage a meeting agenda, resolve
conflict, or share information effectively.
Just as students can learn facilitation skills through a process of observing and imitating an expert
facilitator, there is evidence that students can learn facilitation skills from observing the actions of a
“virtual facilitator” and imitating those actions (Luechtefeld et al, 2007).
In the course “Management for Engineers and Scientists” (Leigh, et al., 2007), taught at the University of
Missouri – Rolla, comments were solicited from a group of students who worked with the virtual
facilitator. Their comments suggest that the four conditions for modeling described by Bandura did occur.
While students were simply asked to comment on the experience of using the virtual facilitator, many of
their comments corresponded to the four conditions for observational learning, as illustrated below:
1.
Attention – “When hearing the ‘interventions’ come up, I found myself replaying the last
few seconds of conversation to see what we said that could have been either worded better or just things
that could have been thought out more.”
2.
Retention – “As we all were learning these interventions, I noticed that I could recognize
intervention (sic) in other members’ speech and ask the appropriate question. I did not always verbally
ask the questions like ‘what makes you see it that way’ or ‘what leads you to say that’, but the question
would ‘jump’ into my mind whenever an obvious intervention was used.”
3.
Reproduction – “I found myself asking the questions of ‘why not?, what prevents
someone from doing it?’ and more before saying something.”
4.
Motivation – One student wrote: “Overall the idea of the software is quite intriguing and
has potential to be a useful tool in training people to avoid saying things without thought. To avoid the
usual pitfalls and traps that don't allow for proper feedback and communication. (sic) This will train users
to communicate and properly frame situations and words so that there is less miscommunication and
confusion.” Another student agreed: “I believe that the software has the potential to be extremely useful
in the engineering education setting.”
While any sort of rules can be implemented as part of the system, the rules currently implemented are
designed to foster the surfacing of information. Table 1 provides a brief overview of the rules currently
implemented.
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Table 1.
Situation
Indicators (IF)
Questions (THEN ASK)
Deletion - Clearly and
Obviously
-ly ending or "it was clear
to me"
Deletion - Comparisons
-er, -est, more/less,
most/least, etc.
What leads you to see it
that way?
Can you give specific
examples?
Better (faster, etc.) than
what?
How, specifically, do you see it
this way?
Deletion - Can't,
Impossible, and Unable
can't, impossible, unable,
no one can
Deletion - Advocacy
without illustration
Distortion - Forcing or
Making
"should, must, expect,
encourage"
"I had to, you made me,
you bore me
What prevents you from
doing so?
(Does anyone see things
differently?)
What leads you to see it
that way?
What experience had you
had that leads you to
believe X?
More rules and features to make the system easier to use are currently being developed.
Conclusion
This paper addresses issues related to utilizing Skinner’s operant conditioning approach versus Bandura’s
observational learning to help students acquire team skills in a distance setting. A virtual facilitator is
presented as a tool to trigger observational learning. The virtual facilitator system is in the early stages of
development. It is being further developed and evaluated as part of NSF Career Award # 0644917.
Participation in evaluation and use of the system by individuals or institutions at this early stage of
development are welcome. During development and evaluation software and support will be provided to
individuals and institutions wishing to engage in educational research.
References
Bandura, A. (1986). Social foundations of thought and action. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Bandura, A. (1971). Social learning theory. New York: General Learning Press.
Bandura, A., Ross, D., & Ross, S. (1961). Transmission of aggression through imitation of aggressive
models. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 63, 575-582. (available online at
http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Bandura/bobo.htm)
Leigh, E., Luechtefeld, R., & Nelson, E., (2007). Out of chaos comes learning: Student and staff
perspectives on co-creating a process management oriented workplace in the classroom. In A.
Erkollar (Ed.), State of the art: Enterprise and business management: A handbook for educators,
consulters, and practitioners (pp. 59-93). Marburg, Germany: Tectum Verlag.
Luechtefeld, R., & Watkins, S. E. (2005.) Automated discourse interventions and student teaming. Workin-Progress (WIP) paper presented at the Frontiers In Education Conference, 19-22 October 2005
Indianapolis, Indiana (refereed) (Available online at
http://fie.engrng.pitt.edu/fie2005/papers/1453.pdf ).
Copyright 2007 Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System
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23rd Annual Conference on Distance Teaching & Learning
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Luechtefeld, R., Watkins, S. E. & Singh, R. K. (2007). Expert system for team facilitation using
observational learning. Paper submitted to the ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference,
10-13 October 2007 Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Skinner, B. F. (1954). The science of learning and the art of teaching. Harvard Educational Review, 24,
86-97.
Skinner, B. F. (1968). The technology of teachin., Englewood Cliffs, NJ.: Prentice-Hall.
Biographical Sketch
Ray Luechtefeld is an Assistant Professor in the Engineering Management and Systems Engineering
department at the University of Missouri – Rolla. He received a B.S. magna cum laude in Electrical
Engineering from the University of Missouri – Rolla, an MBA from the University of Minnesota, and a
Ph.D. in Organization Studies from Boston College. He joined the University of Missouri – Rolla in
2003 as a tenure track faculty member. He also has over ten years of industry experience, including
engineering development with IBM. Dr. Luechtefeld’s research interests include organizational learning
and effectiveness, simulations and games for learning and research, action research and Action Science,
and the facilitation of learning in groups and workplaces.
Address:
E-mail:
URL:
Phone:
Fax:
210 Engineering Management
University of Missouri – Rolla
Rolla, MO 65409-0370
luechtef@umr.edu
http://www.umr.edu/~luechtef
573-341-7241
573-341-6567
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