Could someone PLEASE explain this to me?

[Jeafl]

What exactly is the purpose of making kids do "group" projects in high school?

My daughter is a freshman this year and has been stuck with many group projects this year, mostly with disasterous results.

In her honors biology class she and two other people were supposed to make a diorama of a Tundra. She had a hard time getting the two boys together and work on it. They finally showed up the night before it was due, one came with a glue stick and some construction paper, and the other came with some markers. My daughter ended up working until 1:00 am by herself making the animals out of clay because we couldn't find tundra animals in any store. She essentially did the entire project by herself. Part of the project was an oral report as well. She asked the 2 boys to work on that so they could all present it. They got up in front of the class and one of the boys read everything off the paper with no eye contact, and the other boy got nervous and stammered. As a result all three of them got a C- for the entire project. The teacher said their oral presentation was "poor" because there was no eye contact.

A couple of weeks later she was assigned 3 other girls to work with for a modern dance project for gym class. The three girls did nothing but goof around so my daughter ended up choreographing the entire thing herself, but even then the girls refused to get together. They wanted my daughter to write down the dance and email it to them. How on earth can you read how to do a dance on paper? She did end up emailing it to them, but one of the email addresses was bad and the girl never got it. nor did she call and let us know she never got it. The day they were supposed to do the dance in front of the class, the only one that knew it was my daughter, so they weren't "together" and they all received a D.

Just last week she had to "publish" a pamphlet with 2 other people on Tay Sachs disease. It had to be at least 8 pages long with illustrations and photos. My daughter tried in vain to get the others to work on it to no avail. She ended up doing the entire thing herself with absolutely no input from the others. All 3 of them received an A.

In each case she went to the teacher and tried to explain that she received no cooperation. Every teacher said the same thing--that it is the group's responsibility to work it out. This is very upsetting to my daughter because she needs to keep up her grades because she wants to be a Neonatologist. She has been told by her counselor what she needs to do as far as grades to eventually get into medical school. In the case of the pamphlet she just did it herself, but in the other 2 cases she had no control over the others so the grades were very unfair.

I would just like to know the purpose of a group project. Is it to learn how to work with others? Maybe a teacher could shed some light on this for me.

 

[stinkerbelle]

Originally posted by Jeafl
I would just like to know the purpose of a group project. Is it to learn how to work with others? Maybe a teacher could shed some light on this for me.

I would say yes - it's to teach the students how to work together and accomplish a common goal.

I've been in your daughters position many many times!

In college - I had to do a ton of 'group' projects - especially for my business theory classes. I was a whiz at Powerpoint - so I did ALL the presentations...wrote up people's note cards, was one of the 2 people out of 5 in my group to do the presentation in a business suit and not jeans. ugh.

but what I liked in college - was that we were given the opportunity to 'grade' the other people in our group.

for example - our professor would say "Ok - you have $50,000...divide it amoung the 5 of you based on what they would have recieved after working on the project"

with the presentation I mentioned above - I gave myself and the other guy in the suit (who was the only one who really helped on the project) $25k and the rest gof $0.

it really shows the professor your interpretation of who did what on the project. I don't know if your DD's teacher is doing this - but she might want to...

 

[Maleficent13]

I hated these group projects in school. I have no idea what they are supposed to encourage. Obviously, the kids your daughter was paired with have no ambitions (or at least not the high ones your daughter has), and why should she be penalized for that?

Just saw stinkerbelle's post: if it's supposed to teach kids to work together for a common goal, it's obviously not working very well in your daughter's instance. I think perhaps the idea needs revamped somehow.

 

[Melora]

I have two daughters in high shcool and I know the younger one (9th grade) has done maybe one project like this but I do not think the older one (11th grade) has had to any....

I know it is supposed to make the kids learn how to work together, but sometimes you just have no control of what other people do. I hope these grades do not affect her final grade overall. If this happened to one of our girls, I think my husband would be beating the teachers door down to have them explain what gives.... or at least have the teacher explain how my daughter could have done better with who she was working with.

 

[Divamomto3]

I'm sure the teachers think it is teaching them to work together in a group, because in most jobs in life, you are a team working towards one goal and people have to learn to work together. However, as a parent, and as a former student who always got stuck with the DUDS in group projects, I think it is lousy that her grades are affected by her unmotivated peers.

 

[bumcat]

But that's the problem they don't work together. The deadbeat lazy students don't do anything and the good students don't want to be the tattle tale. My daughter got screwed twice on projects and ended up doing it herself. Her teachers did not want to be bothered by the problem since it was a group project. Never fails she ends up with deadbeat students.
She's graduating this year so no more thank goodness!

 

[missypie]

I always hated group projects in school....the only overnighter I ever pulled in college was on a "group" project that the "group" waited until the last minute to do.

There is some value in teaching folks to work together as a team. But in my experience, both as a past student and a mother of 3 current students, is that the teachers never teach how to work as a team...they just expect you to do it. I think group projects should be done only in class, and should not be graded. They should be a learning experience.

 

[SRUAlmn]

I was always in your daughter's position in college. I just graduated 2 years ago, and I ended up with a high GPA anyway. I don't think you need to worry. It really is beneficial to learn how to deal with people in those types of situations, because now that I am in the real world I am still being assigned group projects that no one helps with! It is frustrating? YES! But it's life, and I think it's a valuable lesson to learn in college where it's a little 'safer' than a real life job. I really don't think it should affect your daughter's grade that much unless every single thing they are graded on is a group project. I actually took a small group communication class where everything was group based and I still got an A. Unfortunately you just have those times where you have to suck it up and do it yourself and know in your heart that you are the better person- it just really stinks!

 

[Meriweather]

My DD HATED those projects.
So unfair to those that work hard and want good grades and the lazy ones just slide right by on their coat tails.

DD had enough of it her senior year.....determined to maintain her 4.0....so when whe got a project with 2 deadbeats and one other worker...as usual the 2 did all the work. When it came time to turn in the project they only put the 2 names on it. The teacher asked why the other names weren't on and was told "Because they did NOTHING!". Teacher's reply...fair enough. They got the good grade the others got a bad grade (and they really didn't care anyway ).

 

[MosMom]

I remember that really irritating me when I was in school as well. However, we always got to give an evalutation of our our classmates contributed and keep a detailed log of who did what. If someone didn't contribute anything, they didn't get their name on the list and they got a lower grade. If teachers are going to do this, I think they need to be smart about it and realize that slackers will be slackers no matter how much "teamwork" goes into it.

 

[WDWAurora]

She needs to make the teachers aware of it before turning it in, making the presentation, etc....Otherwise it could look like she's just trying to get her grade up. If she goes to the teacher beforehand and outlines what she's done to try to get the others involved, then a teacher should be somewhat obligated to step in.

Also as a side note, even when I did these projects in high school, we graded each other. That's a very important part of the project that they obviously need to do there. In college, these projects do tend to get somewhat better. Most people are there for a reason, and it's not to socialize and have fun. These people need the grades and will work to get them.

 

[Rajah]

The only time I *didn't* *HATE* group projects was the *rare* occasion when I got a decent group, or when we were given the chance to evaluate the other group members. Group projects really didn't teach me anything about working with others other than to hate it because the others "never" do their share (or even partial share) of the work.

 

[Geezer]

We never did group projects when I was in high school, but I am a GEEZER, so that would be no help! I hated working with others and still do! That's why I'm mangement!

 

[kadaten]

Originally posted by stinkerbelle

but what I liked in college - was that we were given the opportunity to 'grade' the other people in our group.

Me, too! The group received the assignment grade, but then, each group member was asked to grade each of the other group members. Those grades were averaged to give you a "participation grade" that held the same weight as the assignment grade!! So I did most of the work...we got an A on the assignment, and the others gave me A's for participation, so I got an A. The guy who never showed got an A for assignment, but an F for participation, so he ended up with a C or D. Justice!!

I don't think many teachers at the HS level let the kids do this because many HS students just are objective enough to give fair grades....at that ages they're still very much influenced by peer pressure, so they're likely to give friends grades they don't deserve. Also in HS, you usually know all the people in the class pretty well where in college you don't...so the college kids are able to much more objective in their grading...

 

[Maleficent13]

Originally posted by missypie
There is some value in teaching folks to work together as a team. But in my experience, both as a past student and a mother of 3 current students, is that the teachers never teach how to work as a team...they just expect you to do it.

ITA! That is the problem. You need to teach kids how to work as a team, not just throw them together and say, "Get to work!"

 

[LScot]

I agree with Missypie. And why do the deadbeats always end up with the good students? The teachers know the good students will carry the others through.
I hate group projects (that is why I work alone LOL) but I think a lot of jobs require this type of interaction. Look at "the Apprentice" they did group projects all the time. of course they had to face the board room and had those Trump people watching over them also.

Dh doesn't do group projecs well either. Too many meetings to talk about meeting etc. How about getting some work done? Last time, he had his own group. Just him. He got the job done well.

 

[Ragmop]

It doesn't end in HS.

DS had to do a College Design project with 3 others. Basically DS and one other did most of the work...got an "A", but I guess the 2 that didn't do too much did also-which is not fair.

 

[Hillbeans]

Unfortunately, this is to prepare you for working in the "Real world" where you'll run into a variety of slackers and goof-offs.

The same thing happens in our work project groups in my office. There are your worker-bees and your slackers.

 

[weaselboy]

I LOVED group projects. Less work for me.

 

[Jeafl]

I feel better knowing that you guys (except Weaselboy ) agree with me.

I don't really care about the gym grade, but the honors biology is very important, and that was a third of her final grade.

I really wish the teachers would let them grade each other for participation, although as someone else said, peer pressure may encourage them to make some bad decisions.

I guess I don't know what the answer is. It would be interesting to hear from some teachers though to get their side of it.