When are group project-based workshops best?

Although students might initially dread having to work in a group, bear in mind that their hesitation usually has to do with feeling uncomfortable about the mechanics and feeling shy. After they feel a sense of competence and confidence, working together to complete a project can be one of the most fruitful learning experiences of their education. Not only do they learn about a topic or skill, but they also practice interacting with each other and their "soft skills" while working in a distributed environment, much like the one we work in today in our cloud-based, global workplace.

However, to avoid frustration, it's important to carefully choose how and when you have students work in groups. If you know your students have widely varying schedules, live in different time zones, and have variable access to high-speed internet, you might need to give them certain guidelines so that they will be very supportive of each other...