Team learning in teacher teams: team entitativity as a bridge between teams-in-theory and teams-in-practice

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate team learning in the context of teacher teams in higher vocational education. As teacher teams often do not meet all criteria included in theoretical team definitions, the construct team entitativity was introduced. Defined as the degree to which a group of individuals possesses the quality of being a team, this makes it possible to extend team learning research from strict teams-in-theory to various types of teams-in-practice, including teacher teams. The team learning beliefs and behaviours model, including team entitativity, was applied to teacher teams, assessing whether it still stands in these non-strict teams. Data were collected from 105 teams and analysed using multilevel analysis. Results showed that team entitativity, psychological safety and group potency were related to the occurrence of team learning. The latter appeared to be significantly related to team effectiveness, and the formation of mutually shared cognition was found to be a mediating variable in this relationship.

Appendix

Instrument composition and factor analyses

Group potency

This 6-item scale including items such as “This team has confidence in itself” and “This team believes it can be very effective” was also used by Sargent and Sue-Chan (2001) and Gibson et al. (2000). It was based on an original scale from Guzzo et al. (1993).

Psychological safety

Items captured by this 7-item scale derived from Edmondson (1999) included, for example, “In this team it is safe to have a deviant opinion or to utter criticism” and “It is difficult to ask other team members for help” (reversely scored).

Team learning behaviours

Three team learning behaviours—construction, co-construction and constructive conflict—were captured as one factor in this 9-item scale that was based on three different questionnaires. These include the questionnaire of Visschers-Pleijers et al. (2003) that assesses learning processes in a collaborative learning context, the perceptions of learning processes measured in the Edmondson (1999) questionnaire and, finally, the Van Offenbeek (2001) questionnaire. Sample items include “If something is not clear, we ask each other questions” (construction), “The team members draw conclusions from ideas that were discussed in the team” (co-construction) and “Opinions and ideas of team members are critically questioned” (constructive conflict).

Mutually shared cognition

The scale for measuring MSC consisted of 6 items including, for example, “At this moment, we agree on the strategy to use in order to achieve our goals” and “At this moment, we have a shared understanding of our task”. The scale is based on an adjustment of the self-scoring instrument assessing shared understanding of Mulder (1999).

Team effectiveness

The 4-item scale measuring team effectiveness measured the three dimensions of team effectiveness as defined by Hackman (1989): performance, viability and learning. These were operationalised by Van den Bossche et al. (2006) by means of 2 items assessing team performance: the process (“We completed the task of the team in a way we all agree upon”) and the product (“I am satisfied with the performance of our team”). One item scales team viability (“I would like to work with this team in the future”), and the last 1 assesses learning (“We learned a lot as a team”).

Team entitativity

Since team entitativity is a multidimensional construct, the scale to measure team entitativity captured and combined different constructs in an 18-item scale. This included 2 items for being an intact social entity (e.g. “My team is one coherent entity rather than a collection of individuals”) that were based on the entitativity questions formulated by Carpenter et al. (2008). Four items measuring social cohesion were included (e.g. “I get along with the other members of my team”), derived from Sargent and Sue-Chan (2001). The 4 items to capture task cohesion (e.g. “The team members have conflicting aspirations for the team’s performance” (reversely scored)) were derived from Carless and de Paola (2000). Finally, 4 items for task interdependence (e.g. “I depend on my team members for information and advice”) and 2 of the 4 items measuring outcome interdependence (e.g. “When my team members succeed in their job, it works out positively for me”) were based upon Van der Vegt et al. (1998). Two items were added to the outcome interdependence scale to capture sharing of responsibilities (e.g. “In this team, we share responsibilities for the outcomes and we hold each other responsible for their realisation”). Reliability analysis showed high internal consistencies of both scale components (social and task team entitativity).

Confirmatory factor analyses

Because a validated questionnaire was used in this study (except for team entitativity), confirmatory factor analyses were conducted in order to assess whether the structure of the original questionnaire was replicated in the data. Since the model consists of three parts, three CFAs were performed. The first CFA assessed the adequacy of the scales of group potency and psychological safety (referring to beliefs about the interpersonal context). The second one tested whether the team learning behaviours (TLBs) fitted to the data, and the third CFA assessed the fit of the outcomes MSC and team effectiveness. In the latter CFA, one covariate between items of the same scale was added based upon the modification indices in order to enlarge the model fit. Respectively, the corresponding CFI values were 0.92, 0.94 and 0.98; TLI values were 0.90, 0.93 and 0.97, all adding up to the norms of an adequate fit of the model to the data uttered by Schumacker and Lomax (1996). The root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) and standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) values affirmed the adequacy of the model fit. RMSEA values respectively equalled to 0.083, 0.086 and 0.064, and SRMR values were 0.068, 0.042 and 0.027, all below 0.09 showing an acceptable fit of the model (Brown and Cudeck 1993; Hu and Bentler 1999). All items included only loaded significantly on the factor they were predicted to load on. However, as 1 item of the MSC scale had a really low factor loading for this scale (0.27), it was decided to exclude this item from further analysis.

Exploratory factor analysis

An EFA (maximum likelihood analysis, varimax rotation with extraction of factors with an eigenvalue higher than 1.00 and a cut-off criterion for factor loadings of 0.40) was performed on the construct of team entitativity and showed three underlying components. Based upon the scree plot and communalities, it was chosen to retain two factors. On the first component, the items of intact social entity, social cohesion, three items of task cohesion and outcome interdependence had high factor loadings (between 0.50 and 0.78). Looking at the item level showed that the underlying construct might be related to a social aspect of entitativity, a feeling of we-ness, of being united to reach their goals, of going for it together as a team and being responsible as a team, which will be referred to as social team entitativity. The second component included the items of task interdependence (factor loadings ranging from 0.76 to 0.83) and thus showed the task-related aspect of entitativity, needing each other to perform a task, which will be referred to as task team entitativity. One item measuring task cohesion (“This team gives me insufficient opportunities to improve my personal performance(s)” (reversely scored)) showed a low load (<0.40) on both components and was excluded from further analysis.