Group Work: Do You Require It or Offer an Alternative?

May 5th, 2010 By: Diane Trim in Articles, Teachers' Corner

One year, I had a student in my high school foreign language class whose mother was the principal of one of our district’s schools and whose father was the chairperson of my department.

Kelly was a smart kid who excelled in nearly every subject and was the standout on the varsity volleyball team. Kelly also didn’t like to do group work. Of any kind. No skits, no dialogues, no games with partners. Nothing.

I called mom before I realized that she was the principal of one of our schools. “What sort of alternative assignment will you offer Kelly?” she asked me.

“Uh. Er. I was expecting her to perform the dialogue like everyone else. Give and take is important in foreign language and…” I said.

The principal told me that her daughter’s grade would not suffer because another student wasn’t prepared for class. Her daughter would not carry another student and do the other kid’s work, either. I was told that Kelly would receive her own, tailor-made assignments.

I was young, new to the district, and happy to have a job. I didn’t argue.

Kelly’s dad came to check on me to make sure that his daughter’s assignments were indeed crafted especially for her.

The kid, to her credit, just mumbled that she wanted the same assignment as the rest of the class. She didn’t want to stick out or to give me more work. She just wanted to work alone. I just wanted my first year in the new district to go smoothly. I had no desire to set my department chairperson and a building principal against me. I did the extra work and didn’t think about it any further. I didn’t have the time or the courage.

Forcing Students to Work in Groups

In a recent Teaching Professor Blog post from education professor Maryellen Weimer, Weimer wrote about a group of higher education professors who had been discussing the merits of students working in groups and by themselves.

Weimer wrote about the usual dilemma that teachers face: shouldn’t teachers require students to complete at least some group work? After all, most professions require at least some group work. Isn’t it a disservice to students not to prepare them to work well with others?

A professor looked at the discussion from a different view point, Weimer wrote.

Then Professor Betsy Mudler made an interesting observation—something I’d never thought of before. We are concerned about whether we should “force” (maybe the word’s too strong, “require”) student participation in group work. But when we have students working individually, we aren’t in the same quandary about those learners who really do better when they are working with others. What if one of them should approach us with a request to work on the project with others? Would the request take us by surprise? I suspect it would. Professor Mudler’s point was that our lack of concern about individual work speaks to the strengths of those assumptions we make about value of working alone and figuring it out for yourself.

Weimer concludes that both working alone and in groups has value. We should meet both needs in the classroom.

Finding the Middle Ground

Unlike Weimer’s professors, it’s hard for secondary school teachers to just require their students to complete a group project. Teachers often have push back from parents and students when we assign group work. If I could go back in time and give my younger and more naïve self a little advice, it would have been to lean on the sound pedagogy behind group work, especially in foreign language. I would have said something to the high-powered parents about wanting what was best for Kelly and her foreign language acquisition. I would have said something about best practice in foreign language and how listening to another speaker is essential to a student’s progress in the language.

The problem I would still have is making sure that group grading is fair and that individuals are rewarded for their work. Is it better to assess students separately or based upon their group output? Which is best – peer evaluations, individual grades/group product grade, group grades only, individual grades only, rubrics, or student-created rubrics?

I don’t think any one of these group grading schemes is the best. They’re good attempts, but none is a perfect assessment instrument.

The second challenge of group work is the social loafing aspect. Social loafing is the term for students who, when surrounded by achievers, choose to coast instead of pitch in and help. How do you encourage these students to step up instead of sit back? Sure, you circulate around the room and monitor students. Yes, you encourage the social loafers to open a book or pick up a pencil. However, the reality is that if they choose not to participate, the group members will end up picking up the slack.

So, readers, do you have the magic solution? Have you discovered the best scheme for picking groups? Do you have the ultimate group grading procedure? Do you allow your students to choose between working individually or in groups? How do you convince parents that group work is a marvelous thing? How do you encourage the social loafers to stop coasting and start helping the group? Please share your wisdom with all of us in the comments.

Tags: achievement, grades, group work