Hi Samuel!
It gets back to the old saying, "the best way to learn something is to teach it to someone else," and the residual effect is that students, as you suggest, really do learn well from their peers. Thanks for your comments about students giving a group progress report / presentation. Such an activity not only reinforces their actual tasks, but encourages the use of critical-thinking and communicaiton skills, two skill sets that they will have to have to be successful in the workplace. And a "group or team" grade, if used under the right parameters, creates an interesting set of group dynamics. Bravo!
Jay Hollowell
ED106 Facilitator