Most of my classes have cliques. I agree with your method of counting off to separate the cliques. This too elminates the alienation of students if groups do not want to select them.
Keeping the students focused on the topic.
Motoring the groups.
letting a leader evolve.
Using student group assignments provide and encourage them to learn and work well with others; which is good for their career world. However, group work sometimes poses challenges for some students to contribute to the assignment. Thus, I still grade them individually based on their contribution to the assignment.
I have to be honest. I do not use groups. After going through this course, I am going to use them in my next block of courses in August.
One challenge is when a group project extends over a period of time and one or more of the group members is often absent from class. Another problem is when a group member doesn't understand how to or feel the need to do his/her share of the work. On the other hand, there can be problems when one or more group members feel smarter/superior/better, so no one else can measure up to the "expected" standard. However, I still believe in group work, especially on a short-term basis (not on a major project). In the workplace, teamwork is so important, both on projects and on a day-to-day basis. So learning how to work within the confines of group work is key. It's up to me to guide and monitor progress, and to evaluate/adjust to feedback.
Since I am new, I am interested in using student groups for a final project. If the majority of the students are adults with other commitments, do you think it would be to much to ask of them to get together on their free time to work on a project or do they just use e-mail as a way of communicating back and forth?
For me the biggest challenge with student groups is that I always hated them. I delayed using them, even refusing to allow them when asked, until last term when encouraged to give them a chance. I was amazed at the incresed learning, improvement in the student projects and there were less projects to grade another plus.
One challenge as an instructor is to make sure each student is contributing. One or two students tend to try to take the lead in each group, so the rest of the students simply follow their lead without contributing much. Group self assessments help to prevent this, but some students like to be leaders and some like to be followers. Perhaps we could assign a different leader with each group activity.
Combining several students with different personality styles makes achieving one desired goal different. I assign a group presentation in a public speaking class, and the group members all want to go their own route. I like this assignment because it teaches students to work together and overcome their differences.
I observe that some students tend to be lazy and rely on the other members of the group. This is where I take them to the real world. I call each group a "department" where each member is called an "employee." To discourage laziness, each one will be evaluated by their individual performance, which will be the basis for a "promotion and salary increase," in the form of a grade, of course.
On top of this, at the end of the session, I give the best "department of the week" award to the group, again in the form of a grade, to emphasize the importance of being a team-player.
This gives them a feel of how it is in a real organization--you do your work, you get credit.
One of the challenges of students working in groups is for each student to feel that he or she is an inportant member of the group and that each student will have an opportunity to contribute to the group tasks assigned. It is also a challenge for the instructor to emphasize and insist that each student's contributions to the group are accepted and respected so that each member of the group feels that he or she is a valuable, contributing member of that group. The instructor, realizing these challenges, should emphasize the importance of these concepts when assigning students to their respective groups.
The most challenging of students groups is when there is a dead line and at the last minute one of the group did not do their part, making the presentation/discussion look very inadequate. Example: Given a project, the division was made, the majority of the group had done their part, one individal said that they where ready with the information needed. The day came and the individual informed the group that it was ready, forgot at home, would give it tomorrow(date due). All information that was avaiable was put together that evening(the required information was given in an outlined to the student, all that was needed was the percentage and the population). When the day came the individual brought information that was not relevant to the project, causing the other students to go running to try to salvage the project. The individual ended having to repeat the course, and the other students got a grade according to their research done. After this I just get them together for information/research and most of the projects due are mostly individual.
The curriculum of my classes is built around group work almost every day. I find that there are sometimes personality conflicts between students, especially those of disparate backgrounds. I use those moments to teach the students that they will have to work with all kinds of people in the workforce. Though we may not get along well with everyone we are all working toward the same goal and can use that fact to get past conflicts.
My biggest challenge is when you have a group of both A and C students...The C students are doing their best but that isn't the same as the A students idea of best and they sometimes feel shunned. Or the A students think the C are being lazy when in reality they have worked just as hard if not harder to come up with the information.
Student groups can be challenging in several ways. It's always a challenge to identify the proper diversity in each group. I also find it necessary to keep "chatter" in check. Student groups, on occasion, can get off topic and need to be redirected.
I usually have the group elect a group leader and the group leader assigns different members specific jobs or portions of the assignment to cover. This way it is more of a pooling of information and the one that does not put together their assigned portion will be clear to all.
I find this difficult because if I assign groups the students are not happy because they got paired with someone who isn't doing work. If I allow the students to pair themselves they only go with their friends who have similar views on the topic so nothing new is being said or considered. Although this is an effective tool it depends on how you go about it. I've tried randomly drawing names "out of a hat" which works to an extent but nothing I've done thus far to make this exercise successful has worked.
I have found that one of the major challenges, as mentioned in the course text here, is making certain the project that you are assigning groups is appropriate for their skill level and that the process of completing the project is well organized into manageable steps with clear objectives that translate into clear tasks for specific group members.
I am not going to comment on the challenges of using students groups but instead would express my observation when students are working as a group.
They tend to become more competitive. I see the group turns into a "team". This is directly the opposite when a student works "individually". When in a group (team), the student's "gear" is shifted towards working harder to outdo the other group (team) especially when both groups are working on the same project.
I see this behavior motivating as it teaches them to be a "team player".
Ferdinand
One of the challenges of students working in groups is the dynamics and developing assignments that have equal division of labor. In the past, I have had oral presentations with 2 students working together on 1 project, and one student tends to do the majority of the work. You may have a student that likes to do all the work because they are very interested in the topic of the report, and the other student is only there for a grade and the ride. Then, it just bothers me to give them both an equal grade when you know that one of them didn't earn it. Our class size has been small lately, so that is also an issue.
From time to time there will be someone that has a complaint about the group they have been assigned. The best response is to tell them you are being challenged to over come minute differences so that the overall achievement is success!
