Development of University Students’ Teamwork Skills in Distance Learning Education

Developed teamwork skills are one of the highest demand skills among employers. However, self-isolation and the transition to distance learning made it much more difficult to develop these skills. Teachers have to look for new technologies, methods and types of activities in order to be able to develop students' teamwork skills in conditions of distance education. The purpose of the article is to assess the development of teamwork skills among students of Moscow universities and to identify the main restrictions in the development of these skills in the conditions of distance learning. The following tasks were set: 1) to analyze the research of domestic and foreign scientists on the issues of teamwork skills development; 2) to conduct an initial testing of students in these skills; 3) to identify the main restrictions of teamwork in distance learning; 4) to analyze the data obtained and to formulate conclusions. The study involved first- and second-year students (Moscow State University of Food Production, n=246; Russian State Social University, n=251). The results showed that the university students who had taken part in the research did not have well developed teamwork skills. The differences between the students of these universities are not significant according to the method of Student's t-distribution. The method of expert assessment revealed the following restrictions of teamwork in the conditions of distance learning: the difficulty of establishing emotional contact between teamwork participants; increasing the labor intensity of the educational process in the conditions of distance learning; low level readiness of some teachers to use ICT (information and communication technologies); the differences in the social and economic environment and available facilities for students, which make it difficult for them to be involved in teamwork. The need for purposeful activities to develop teamwork skills in conditions of distance learning was proved. (Abstract)