How to Survive a Group Project Apocalypse
(NAMES HAVE BEEN CHANGED FOR CONFIDENTIALITY)
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When incorrectly
handled, group projects can end up to be a massive headache. Anybody who has
(somehow survived) one before may attest to the lack of communication within
the group, absent due dates, that one person who will not even try to do any work, and somehow managing to get everything together hours before the
presentation or project is due. Out of all my academic experiences, I can
distinctly recall one group project that took place during my junior year of
high school.
It was AP (Advanced Placement) Government that assigned
this particular project to me. The
teacher assigned the class into groups of three. I was lucky enough to be
grouped up with two of my friends who were both football players and shared a
German III class with me that term: Dan and Chris. We were instructed to design
a poster about legislation. In class, we had all agreed to meet up at Dan’s
house that evening at 6:00 pm. Dan and Chris had football practice after school,
so they claimed that they could pick me up from my house to make their schedule
easier.
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At 6:20 pm, I was pacing around the living room in my
house, wondering where Dan’s car was. I did not get it. We had communicated a precise date, time, and mode of
transportation. Unfortunately, my error was that I had forgotten to ask Dan for
his cell phone number just in case of an emergency. Finally, I see a van pull
up to the front of my house. I soon became incredibly confused when Dan and
Chris walked up to my porch and said, “We decided on the way here to just do
the project at your house.”
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Having two football players in your house makes for a
memorable group project experience. My mom baked maple and bacon cookies for me to take to
Dan’s house, but we all decided just to eat them in my house. For the first
half hour, like any group, we were incredibly focused. The next two and a half
hours that followed, however, consisted of Dan and Chris having a friendly
debate about creationism versus evolution, trying to find a decent song on YouTube
because Chris kept insisting that we listen to Christian rock over any other
genre (which surprisingly was not as bad as Dan and I thought it would be), and
then finally Chris and Dan nearly passing out on my couch at around 9:00 pm while
I absent-mindlessly colored in giant block letters with red and blue crayons.
After all of that effort, we only got about half of the
project done. At the end of the night, we all agreed to meet up during our
German III class to finish the poster. Overnight, Chris’ sister drew an eagle
on a branch in the background of our poster for us to color in the morning. Our
German teacher, being the saint that she was, allowed us to finish working on our poster during class.
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At the end of the day, our AP Government teacher gave us
an A for the final product and our (improvised) presentation. Despite our lack
of proper communication at the beginning, the project came together because we were all on friendly terms. Since we all knew each other before the task was
assigned, it made the hard work more tolerable. Instead of having one person do
all of the work, we each had our own role in the project. Chris wrote the
bullet pointed notes on the poster, Dan did the majority of the coloring, and I
would print out the pictures to paste to the board. While getting work done, we
were able to laugh at ourselves and have fun with the entire process. Such a
method may be applicable in any sort of situation that requires group work.
Since there was little friction between the members, it caused the product to
evolve into an overall success. If there were any differences in thoughts or
ideas, we were either able to put such conflicts past us or compromised a brand
new concept to apply towards the project. It ended up to become the one group
project I did not undeniably loathe.
Working with friends can sometimes make a group complex. Friends can either pull their weight or slack off. I'm glad you guys were able to pull it together in the end. I am a person who tries to avoid doing work in the ninth hour so working with others who do makes me a little weary. It is important for team members to establish the importance of deliverables, due dates, and appointments, and staying in contact. Good to see you took some positives away from the situation, got a good grade, and analyzed areas in need of improvement. Great work!
ReplyDeleteYour title was interesting, eye-catching and somewhat amusing. As I read through your blog, your pictures helped me understand what you were feeling. Also, they were funny, too. Having friends as group members can be a good or bad thing depending on the situation. Even though you and your group members had some complication, it worked out at the end with a good grade. It's great that you self assessed your group - what happened and how to build upon that experience. Overall, well done!
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