Through our 184 project, I was recently caught off guard by the honesty of a student post(Kadie), who was struggling with working within a group setting:
I have had difficulty in group work this year. A couple weeks ago we were split into 6 groups. I was in a group with 4 other girls and 1 boy. We were working well until the very last day. We had a lot of arguments and yelling. We ended up getting our teacher involved and getting her help to figure it out. It wasn’t completely resolved but we were able to work together.
The reality of this situation was that the student was simply expressing how many people feel when dealing with a group of people. It can often be hard and taxing on adults and children alike, yet the idea of “collaboration” is one we know is needed in our world today. I am a huge believer in the idea that innovation and growth is more likely to come from the minds of a group (John Seely Brown refers to this as the “Spike”) , then the mind of an individual, yet I could understand the struggle that “Kadie” shared.
When we talk about the importance of collaboration in discussing education, it often seems we leave out the idea that we do need time to reflect and learn on our own as well. I take a huge amount of joy in the reflective solitude I gain from a weekly Starbucks ritual where I have the opportunity to just “catch up”, read, and write. That time on my Saturday, prepares me for the rest of the week and what I am going to share with our organization. Groups are powerful, but it is essential that we take time to build our own strengths so we have something to contribute.
Collaboration is such a huge part of what we do in our world, but we need to give students the opportunity to reflect and learn. Not sit down and give them something to do on their own, but the opportunity to sit, think, and connect their knowledge in a way that is meaningful to them. This Jackie Gerstein post talks about how we often lose focus of giving students the opportunity to just sit and reflect on their learning:
They are products of a standardized system where they were asked to memorize standardized information and spit that information out on standardized tests. When finished with one unit of information, they were asked to quickly move onto the next unit. They were not given the time, skills, and opportunities to extract personalized meanings from their studies. Reflection was not part of their curriculum as it cannot be measured nor tested.
There are articles all over that discuss the idea of “disconnecting” and although I agree with many of the reasons for disconnecting, I believe that I have formed some pretty powerful relationships from my online connections. Turning my devices off is not just hitting a switch. It is often also disconnecting with family and friends that mean the world to me. Balance (whatever that may be for an individual) is key.
I do however believe that we all need to teach our kids to have some comfort in being alone with their thoughts, and provide time for them to just make connections in their learning; like many of us have learned and have the freedom to do. When we give them time to do that, won’t they be able to come back to that group and give something back that is much deeper? Just like we need to work with our students to develop those collaborative skills that Kadie struggled with, it is also important that we help them learn, and provide time for, the process of reflective solitude. With this, their learning can become so much deeper.
