More than just talk: Exploring how supervisors through structured activities can support peer learning in project groups at a PPL-university

The present project emerged from our personal interest in providing better and more diverse supervision for project groups at Roskilde University. Supervision usually takes the form of a dialogue at supervisor meetings, and we wanted to explore activities that can supplement the dialogue-based supervision. As supervisors we often experience fragmented and individualized projects and want to investigate how to improve collaboration and common understanding in project groups. Group work has a great potential for peer learning but this potential may not be realized without proper facilitation (David Boud, 2001). In this project we design an activity - a presentation ‘seminar’ - where students present and discuss relevant literature. The activity was tested on three project groups that we currently supervise. We found that the activity improved the learning of subject matter, helped secure coherency in the projects, and in general helped the groups progress. However, in one project group the outcomes were limited and discussions superficial which we ascribe to an unguided choice and preparation of the literature they presented in the activity. This points to the need of careful preparation and scaffolding from the supervisor, when initiating activities