The five phases of COIL

1. Pre-COIL student preparation: instructors, separately in their own classes, prepare students for successful collaboration by explaining the purpose and objectives of COIL;
2. Introduction: students set their expectations, meet their international peers and familiarize with the assignment and the digital tools;
3. Engagement: the first stage of students’ collaboration;
4. Collaboration: the main stage of student collaboration involving synchronous and asynchronous work to produce a joint outcome
5. Conclusion: the final stage involving presentations of final project and outcome, feedback, and reflection.

(Doscher, S. & Rubin, J., 2023, pp. 188-189)

Phases and timeline: full version of 7- to 10- week COIL, including a week of ‘on site’ reflection and assessment as part of conclusion.

Phase	Task	Duration
Pre-COIL student preparation	Introduce COIL: Present why students are doing COIL and what to expect Provide background information on the international partner’s institution, cultures and languages Assess and address students’ expectations and possible concerns	1 in-class meeting/lesson, week #1
Introduction	Conduct icebreakers: bring students together synchronously to engage in getting-to-know activities Introduce platforms and technology tools students are going to use. Provide instructions and practice using the tools. Introduce the task: take students through the purpose and objectives of the collaborative task.	1-2 online synchronous meetings, week #2 and 3
Engagement	Form groups/teams: assign students to groups/teams of no more than six, with similar numbers of students from each side. Model online collaboration in the teams: Have students team engage in a small task that involves students’ personal, cultural and/or disciplinary perspectives on the topic. Establish group/team roles, responsibilities, and meeting plan: Have students compare their work schedules and school timetables to set dates and times for synchronous meetings, identify team roles.	1-2 online synchronous meetings, week #4 and 5
Collaboration	Student groups/teams collaborate synchronously and asynchronously to develop and finalize their group project. Monitor students’ individual and group work: check in with students regularly and address challenges. Mentor students and provide support in problem-solving	2- 3 weeks of students’ individual and group work, week #6-8
Conclusion	Student teams present their final products/project outcomes during a virtual presentation session Both instructors provide feedback and facilitate student reflection online (as a concluding part of the virtual presentation session or in a asynchronous task) Facilitate individual and group reflection of your students’ intercultural online experiences in class	1 online synchronous meeting and 1 ‘on site’ face to face, week #9-10

(Adopted from: Doscher, S. & Rubin, J., 2023, pp. 188-189)

---

The revised 4-phase COIL

Revised/shortened version of 6- to 7-week COIL with the focus on developing students’ intercultural competence.

Note that the activities in the engagement phase are incorporated into the introduction phase.

Phase	Task	Duration
Pre-COIL student preparation [see below]	Introduce COIL: the purpose and goals assess students’ expectations assess students experience and competences in intercultural (online) collaboration before the COIL	1 in-classroom meeting/lesson of at least 60 min, week #1
Introduction [see below]	Virtual tour: each instructor provides information on the institution, country’s cultures and languages. Conduct an icebreaker for all students in the common virtual session. Introduce and recommend platforms and technology tools [ch 7]. Conduct a brief training. Introduce the task and objectives, including the time frame. Introduce/discuss the norms of intercultural online collaboration and tips for appropriate communication [see below] Form teams and conduct an icebreaker for teams in breakout rooms [see Zoom tutorial in ch 7] Have students create meeting plan based on the COIL time frame and their work/study schedules Have students think about their team responsibilities and team roles	1-2 online synchronous meetings, week #2 and 3
Collaboration [see below]	Student groups/teams collaboration Monitor students’ work but respect students’ autonomous learning Mentor students and provide support	2 weeks of students’ individual and group work, week #4-5
Conclusion [see below]	a virtual presentation session Instructors’ feedback and student reflection Follow-up reflection and self-assessment of students’ intercultural learn	1 online synchronous meeting and 1 ‘on site’ face to face, week #6-7

Pre-COIL student preparation TIPS:

Good preparation counts:

• Explain to students what COIL is about and the opportunities it offers, such as engaging in interaction with international peers. Once students fully understand the core principles of COIL they will be excited about the upcoming collaboration and interactions (Guth and Helm, 2017, p. 47).
• Explain to students why you integrate COIL as a part of the course activities.
• Explain how COIL will help students achieve the learning outcomes defined in the course and what competences will students improve thanks to intercultural online collaboration.
• Invite guest speakers such as COIL alumni to describe their experiences with intercultural online collaboration.
• In-class activities to prepare students for meaningful intercultural interactions in COIL:
  • Discuss with students their expectations including potential obstacles and benefits (e.g., what they hope to learn, how they will work in groups and work through misunderstandings, etc.); have students reflect on what they expect. pre-COIL surveyExample of survey before COIL
  • Have students reflect on their prior intercultural experiences and self-assess their intercultural competence. Self-assessment grid of intercultural online collaborationExample of self-assessment grid
  • Help students identify potential intercultural communication barriers and ways to address them.
  • Training and trial runs: show students how to use the platform or apps you intend for the COIL and have them try the apps.
  • Consider giving students an insight into intercultural competence learning and models [see, for example Deardroff’s model of Intercultural Competence Building] Doscher, 2023a, pp. 256-257, Deardorff, 2023, p. 276).
• Introduce students to Netiquette, give tips for appropriate and effective online intercultural communication, and how to tackle language challenges (see Corbett et al, 2024, p. 38, Deardorff, 2023, p. 277, pp. 280-281) Instructors may do this as part of their students’ ‘on site’ preparation for the COIL and/or as part of online introduction with the students abroad. It is essential that students at both partnered institutions are familiarized with the Netiquette and possible language/intercultural challenges. The purpose and goals of COILOnline collaboration and netiquette

Introduction TIPS:

Icebreakers

Ice-breaking helps:

• break the ice that may inhibit the interaction with unfamiliar others and warm people’s feelings toward each other (Doscher, 2023a, p. 257)
• develop certain level of familiarity with others and helps establish students’ relationships across cultures (ibid, p. 258).

Ice-breaking is also meant to:

• help students to tackle the challenges of intercultural online collaboration: students are entering an online space with people they do not know, with values and perspectives different from their own and speaking different languages (Corbett et al, 2024, p. 44)
• arouse curiosity among students by inviting them to share and compare aspects of their personal experiences and preferences
• support group and task cohesion: encourage students to engage with others and commit to the tasks that group members are required to do (ibid, p. 45)
• encourage the display of individual identity and enable students to engage in an exploration of one another’s’ identities (ibid, pp. 45-47).

Examples of icebreaker activities for synchronous virtual sessions:

For initial meeting of all students in the virtual classroom in Zoom [see Zoom tutorial in ch 7]:

‘What are you passionate about?’

Students are asked to tell their name and express in one or two sentences what they are passionate about. Telling names is important for knowing how to pronounce students’ names correctly and how students prefer to be addressed. Rather than sharing where students come from and other identity markers that may accentuate differences and/or trigger stereotypes, students first share what matters most to them (i.e. their names) and look for commonalities based on their likes.

Before students’ group work in teams:

Assign student teams to breakout rooms and enable them screen sharing [see Zoom tutorial in ch 7]. The time length of activity depends on the number of students in the group/breakout rooms (no more than 5-6 members), Note that ice-breaking activities are not meant just for the first-time meeting. Students may do them before every virtual meeting and collaboration they start.

‘Explore one another’s identity’

Introduce yourself briefly and write down five words (on the whiteboard or in the chat [see Zoom tutorial in ch 7] that best describe you. Others may ask two questions to learn more about you.

‘Show on the map’

Show on the map where you are right now or where you live or a place where you like to spend time (show the exact locality, not just the country/state). Tell others what you particularly like or dislike about the locality. Others ask one or two questions.

‘What’s the last picture that you took?’

Go to your phone and show the last photo you took for others to see. Share a story behind the picture.

‘Exploring cultures through drawing’’

Using the Zoom Whiteboard [see Zoom tutorial in ch 7], students from one institution will draw a picture representing their perceptions of the country/culture/location of students from the partnered institution. Instructors encourage creativity and thoughtful representation.

Once the drawings are complete, instructors from both institutions will facilitate discussion to reflect on and debunk any stereotypes that may have emerged.

Through guided dialogue, students will explore the diversity and complexity of the culture/country/location depicted in the drawings, challenging cultural assumptions and fostering mutual understanding.

Creating meeting plan: students’ responsibility and instructor’s control

Based on the COIL time frame, instructors recommend to students how much time and how many collaborative online meetings they will need to accomplish a group project.

Instructors likewise should monitor students’ progress.

Students should decide and agree with their international peers, when and what times they meet synchronously in their team to work on the project. The same approach must be followed by the instructors at both institutions. If one instructor attempts to gain more control over the process by having students’ holding their online meetings within the regular class times, while the instructor from the partnered institution allows their students to decide for themselves when and where to meet, the collaboration will be negatively affected. The lack of alignment may lead to unfulfilled expectations, frustration, and loss of interest on part of students and instructors.

Assigning students to teams

Instructors from both institutions should collaborate together when assigning students to international/intercultural teams.

We recommend instructors to follow the criteria:

• group of maximum 6 members and similar ratio of students from both institutions [see ch 3].
• students distributed based on their language competence, age skills, previous experiences including intercultural training and/or previous study abroad experience.

Peers from one institution may express a preference to join the same international team rather than being assigned to different teams by the instructor. Student-led choice of peers may be desirable, especially if the students express anxiety from the unknown and want to feel safe in the early stages of the collaboration.

Collaboration TIPS:

Keep in mind that you as an instructor need to have the skills to discuss, facilitate, and moderate students’ intercultural online interactions. Training how to facilitate intercultural discussion in culturally appropriate ways is recommended (Guth and Helm, 2017, p. 50)

Tips for students’ appropriate and effective synchronous communication

Students need to know the fundamental norms of online intercultural communication and should be familiar with ways to engage in appropriate intercultural communication [see above] before they commence collaboration in teams.

Keep in mind that online communication has its specifics particularly when it comes to non-verbal communication. For example, while in class students can show their mood through various face expressions (intentionally or unintentionally), demonstrate that they keep attention to what is being said by nodding their heads, or express disapproval by murmuring, alternative ways need to be used to communicate non-verbally in an online environment:

• have cameras on and use creative profile images when cameras are off
• encourage students to use emojis to express feelings or approval [see Zoom tutorial in ch 7]
• show students how to use chats to supplement or complement non-verbal signal conveyed via the screen and to make up for shortcomings in spoken language, for example in pronunciation [see Zoom tutorial in ch 7]

Students should reflect on their intercultural collaborative experience to be able to learn what are the acceptable ways to show disagreement, how to provide feedback to other peers in a culturally sensitive way and what are the expectations in expressing emotion.

As part of their intercultural learning, students in synchronous online communication need to develop intercultural skills (Gudykunst, 2004, pp. 260-263):

• attending and following skills:
  • students have their cameras on and keep attention to nonverbal signals communicated through the screen: facial expressions, tone of voice, use of silence, head nodding, eye contact (look into the camera, not at the screen, when speaking)
  • they give one another time to speak and are aware of the fact that response time in computer-mediated online communication takes generally longer than in face-to-face offline interactions (Deardorff, 2023, p. 278)
• comprehending skills:
  • students ask questions to seek better understanding of what was said, using phrases such as ‘Help me understand more about….’, ‘I want to be sure I understand what you meant by …..’
  • students suspend judgment and ask sensitively phrased questions, such as ‘What makes you say that?’
  • student speak only from personal experiences and not on behalf of others (ibid, pp. 280-281).

• Students as countries ambassadors

  Particularly in tasks involving culture/countries comparisons, students may be expected to speak on behalf of all their fellow citizens, their culture and country. When asked questions, such as ‘So how does it work in your country?’ they are suddenly called to show expertise on issues they may not be familiar with but feel they are expected to know. Some students may accept the role of their country’s/culture’s ambassadors and try to represent their country in the best light by, for example, debunking stereotypes. Others may actually confirm the stereotypes, such as in ‘Yes, we are like that’. Neither of the two are recommended: students (and teachers) should be aware that their view/perspective of their culture/nation is just a limited vision of the complex picture of their culture.

Tips for communication in asynchronous tasks:

Examples: written posts, e-forums

Instructors may recommend to students the following strategies for appropriate communication::

• mitigation: ‘I know it’s a silly question, but….’
• establishing connection and arising curiosity: “what is your favorite….?”
• personal statement on the topic coming from one’s culture: “I know other people prefer coffee, but for me….”
• elicitation of response: “Looking forward to your responses!”

(Corbett et al, 2024, pp. 52-53)

• attitudinal and emotional verbs, adverbs and adjectives (‘I absolutely love this, this is great!’)
• creative spelling to emphasize or intensify (‘I am soooooo happy!’)
• punctuation, especially CAPITALS and exclamation marks!!!
• emojis

(ibid, p. 70)

Managing group dynamics and team roles

Instructors need to employ a variety of methods to include and engage all students and guide them through the process of working independently and collaboratively toward the completion of the task (Doscher, 2023a, p. 259).

Like in the ‘offline’ classroom environment, in the online environment there will be students who:

• will be in need to control the process and/or the end results of the group work
• will have the ambition for leadership and to initiate and guide group discussion
• will prefer writing things down rather than expressing themselves in front of others
• will be largely content to listen and wait to be assigned what to do
• will not participate for several reasons (e.g., technical issues, not interested in or not knowing about the topic, etc.)

When assigning team roles, students’ personal characteristics, strengths, and possible power imbalances should be taken into account (ibid). Instructors may want to be in control of assigning students’ roles, particularly if they want to ensure students’ equal participation. At the same time, if COIL should develop students’ sense of responsibility and ownership for their actions, students should be given the opportunity to choose roles in deliberation with team members. Instructor guides students’ discussion over division of role and responsibilities by: 1) giving students time for ‘social talk’ and to learn about one another outside the structured activities, for example through various icebreakers [see above] that reveal about students’ personal characteristics, likes and dislikes, 2) making sure students do not choose roles based solely on their personal preferences but step outside their comfort zone to learn and experience new roles and positions in team.

Managing conflicts

While students’ independent work and autonomous learning is encouraged, instructors need to monitor students’ collaboration and notice potential misunderstandings or even conflicts. When an issue arises during synchronous discussion, instructors may use available virtual tools (e.g. raise hand in Zoom) to alert students, let them pause and reflect on the issue. The aim should be to reflect on the negative experience and treat is as a teachable moment (Corbett et al, 2024, p. 89).

Example how to address anxiety present in the online discussion:

“Let’s take a time-out for a second: I’m not sure if you feel this as well, but discussing this topic is making me uncomfortable. Is anybody else feeling this as well? Why do you think we get uncomfortable when this topic comes up?”​

In asynchronous activities, for example in e-forum, instructors monitor students’ posts and intervene in writing when they notice an issue demanding their attention. Students should also know that there is a way to alert an instructor to offending or threatening posts (Corbett et al, 2024, p. 87, Jackson, 2019).

Conclusion TIPS:

Reflecting on the COIL learning experience

Students’ reflection of experience in COIL is fundamental not only at the end but also during the COIL. Reflective experiential learning (Kolb, 1984) in COIL enables students to develop intercultural competences. COIL encourages students to get outside of their comfort zones - where things are no longer familiar, where their points of view are not anymore reinforced through experiences with people they know – and gives them opportunities to engage with peers who will inevitably have different experiences and different perspectives (Guth and Helm, 2017, p. 6).

For example, during COIL students create videos and vlogs through which they share personal experiences and stories from their localities. The ensuing discussion of personal experience across the localities is guided by questions that make students step back from their experience and link it to previous learning and future action (Doscher, 2023a, p. 261). The guiding questions help students recognize their ethnocentric viewpoints, challenge their cultural assumptions, and help them deal with stereotypes by focusing on multiple layers of personhood and multiple identities.

COIL Project of the McLennan Community College (MCC) students in Texas and Czech students at the Faculty of Education, Masaryk University (MUNI)Reflective task example

In the concluding session, students engage in reflecting on their thoughts and feelings about their experience in COIL and graph them for example on the white board in Zoom or Jamborad in Google [see ch 7] for all COIL participants to see.  Alternatively, students reflect on the experience in the class (individually or in pairs/small groups) by writing personal journals and self-assessment and instructors then share main points and findings across the institutions.

The reflection questions could include:

• What is the most significant thing you have learned about yourself through the COIL?
• What was the biggest challenge for you during the COIL? How did you handle it?
• How has your experience helped you prepare for future challenges or life plans?

For more see a post-COIL survey here:

post-COIL surveyExample of survey after COIL

Students may also reflect back on the episodes of their communication failure or conflict, analyze and interpret them at the backdrop of their own communicative and collaborative practices and reflect on how they could be improved in the future (O’Dowd, 2021, n.p.).

Examples of reflective activities:

‘What? So what? Now What?’ (Dooly, 2018, p. 199)

• What? >  What did I learn from this experience? (about myself, about others, about differences?)
• So what? >  Why is this learning important?
• Now what? > What will I do now as a result of this learning?

‘OSEE’ tool for reflection during COIL activities (Berardo and Deardorff, 2012, pp. 58-60, Deardorff, 2023a, p. 293)

• Observe and listen carefully to what is being said.
• State objectively what you hear.
• Explore explanations for the behavior/communication that you observed (explanations could include cultural, physical, personality, family-related explanations)
• Evaluate the explanations as to which one or ones are the most likely for the observed behavior/communication.