Teacher: “This
assignment will be a group project”.... and cue the collective groans.
Students seldom
look forward to group projects. Parents
dread them as well, because, depending on the student, they’ll have to hear
them complain about it in the near future.
Then, there are some students that you are almost suspicious as to why
they are so eager to work in a group project.
THE GOOD
Why does it seem
like such a problem? The truth is we are
all social beings, and we learn best in collaboration with one another. Wise students already collaborate wherever
possible. They create their own study
groups, both in person and online.
Whether a class assignment or a life-problem, they use as many
human-related resources that are at their disposal, and physical proximity is
not a barrier. Many students are most
likely “experts” at informal collaboration without even knowing it.
 |
| From http://collaborativelearning.pbworks.com/w/page/16092838/CollaborativeLearningOverview |
THE BAD
So, why is it a problem in the classroom? For one, the interdependence that naturally occurs in a joint student product also means a loss of autonomy. If there are not clearly defined roles, what happens if a student does not hold up their end of the bargain? There are always some students that are left holding the bag, as others wish to ride on their coattails. There are also other students who dominate the project and refuse to delegate responsibility. As a teacher I have tried to add certain group peer evaluation tools; to "get to the bottom" of what really happened, but I can't say that they have all been "foolproof".
These are some of
the reasons that students hate group work.
Students know who they want to work with, who they don’t want to work
with, and why. They feel forced into “being
forced into arbitrary, mismatched teams in the name of social correctness.”[i] The reality is, not everyone in the real
world will always have the autonomy of choosing who to and not to work with,
but this still an understandable source of frustration.
THE WIKI
So where do Wikis come in? In all fairness, a Wiki is just
one of the many tools that can alleviate such problems in collaborative
work. Let’s say there is a collaborative
group assignment that a teacher initiates for students to work and collaborate
on. Instead of meeting in ONLY in
person, a Wiki, Google Doc or similar tool is initiated by the teacher, and
students are added as users. Each group
member is able to meet and share information electronically at their own time,
and contribute to the same space. Based
on each individual’s unique user identification, it is easy to verify and trace
how each group member contributed, at what point, and in what way. There is also a meeting space for the teacher
to see what is going on throughout the entire process. This way, teachers can help ‘mediate’ and
problem-solve earlier in the process so that the “group work” term does not
have to have such a negative stigma.
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