Each week you will be expected to complete a series of lab activities in your two lab sessions. You will be required to reflect on these in your assignment so make sure you keep records of what you have done.
Resources:
- Microsoft Teams installation files:
- Official app for MacOS and Windows 10.
- Unofficial app for Linux.
At the start of the tutorial session you should check to see who is in your team, there should be between 6 and 9 students per team. You should also check to see what project you have been allocated. Get together with the rest of your team and use the project website to find out more details. Make sure everyone in your team understands what the end goal is. Ask your tutorial supervisor(s) if you have any questions.
- Each team needs a name! Discuss and agree one for your team.
- Early on in the tutorial session email any members of your team who have not turned up to remind them to attend. It it very important that you meet up every scheduled tutorial to avoid falling behind! You will find their email addresses in the University Email address book.
Install the MS Teams app on your smartphone and log in using your University email and password. You should also log in on your desktop computer either using the App (see below) or a web browser such as Chrome.
One person in the team should create a new team using the agreed team name and invite all the other people in the team to join (include those who are missing from the tutorial).
Take time to explore the different features of the software, we will be using this to communicate throughout the module. There is a powerful audio and video conferencing tool set. Try "phoning" other members of the team using the audio call feature.
Perform a detailed analysis of the problem you are going to solve and perform a Skills Audit on your team. There are a list of generic skills listed in the presentation which you will need to supplement with skills related to your choice of project. Try to avoid generic skills and be as specific as possible. Here is a start:
Create a Team Competency Matrix using a simple Red-Amber-Green (RAG) scale as shown in the lecture. This should include skills taken from the skills list provided plus any others you feel might be useful. The result should be something like this (except you will colour in the squares appropriately):
- Red = no knowledge or skill.
- Amber = Some knowledge and skill.
- Green = proficient in this skill.
| Skill | Joe | Sara | Ben |
|---|---|---|---|
| JavaScript Programming | A | G | R |
| JavaScript unit testing | R | R | R |
| Basic git usage | G | G | A |
| Git branching | A | R | R |
| Linux server configuration | R | G | G |
Refine the matrix by replacing the colours with values from a 5 point scale.
- No knowledge or skill.
- A little knowledge and skill.
- Basic understanding and can apply the skill.
- Good understanding and can apply.
- Expert.
From this you should, as a group get a good idea as to where the strengths of the different team member lie. Remember everyone will have something to contribute so it one of your team have consistently marked themselves down have a chat to see why they are judging themselves so harshly and help them identify where they can contribute.
At the end of the process add up the points for each skill area and use this to identify what skills are lacking in the team as a whole. This will help you in the next section.
This should be carried out in small groups of 2 or 3. In these smaller groups, develop a Professional Development Plan for each person who should identify three things they feel they need to learn before the start of the development process in a few weeks (so don't be too ambitious).
Create a top level heading for each of your chosen three topics and, for each, work together to answer the following questions, writing down the answers:
- What do I want to learn?
- What will I do to achieve this?
- What resources and support will I need?
- What will my success criteria be?
We will be reviewing this document in future weeks so keep it safe and refer to it as you carry out your learning.
As you carry out your learning to support this, answer the following, writing the answers down as you do each piece of learning:
- What did you do?
- Why?
- What did you learn from this?
- How will you be able to use this in the team project?