Group Reflection Essay

Thank you for your post. I found it very informative. I too found That small group discussions are very beneficial to the student's education. Small groups discussions allow the teacher to prove those students with one-on-one attention in helping them further their education for that topic. Discussions allow students to not only ask the teachers for questions for clarification on the material but to the students as well. I am a firm believer that students learn great from one another. Discussions allow students to learn from one other. Students are able to communicate the information in ways that relate more to the students learning. Do you think these small group discussions are something you would bring into your classroom?

For this class project, I think my group worked well together on the assignments. We all saw we had responsibilities and were expected to do our own parts for each assignment we worked on. For each assignment, we would split it equally among us and used a tool called Google Docs so we were each on our own computers but working together on one file. Google Docs really made the process easier with reviewing all the information and having it all in one file. If any questions came up we had a group text to communicate when we weren’t on campus grounds for class.

This type of dysfunctional operation of an organization has many ways and opportunities for failure. The basic fundamentals of this process are the beginnings of failure as groups seek conformity and unity they sacrifice everything in order to maintain peace within the group. Many times this will take the individuals creative thoughts and ability to voice the creative edge thinking away. In many organizations this is a process that is continually used. It is perceived that management wants the organizations operation or process to run without any type of question or waves. Below are listed eight of the main symptoms of group think as detailed by Janis, I. L & Manns book “Decision making”

We made sure to stay onto of our work and were able to go back and help other group member who worked after us with their parts as well. Because we worked through Google Drive, we were able to all work on the project equally at the same time. We all logged in, created our slides, added our information and picture, and left comments for one another on there. Bhavik introduced me to a new meaning to the quote, ”I don’t want to see you—die—trying not to suffer,” which I was able to later use in my presentation (Baldwin 264). I set up a group text message so we were able to ask each other questions and stay connected at anytime. Our group also met up in the library the morning before presenting so we could discus how we would present to the class. Working in the group setting was very important because we were able to hear each other’s different interpretations of scenes we did not understand or scenes we analyzed

Through out the process of creating our project as a group there wasn’t as many obstacles as I thought there would be. In other words, everything went smooth it was just what I wanted. I believe the reason for such great outcome was because we all learned how to work as a group and interact with each other because of our Chicano studies class. Knowing what we did wrong in group projects in that class certainly made me change and understand what group studies really are and mean. Therefore, there wasn’t any problems as a group we communicated well and if a person couldn’t meet up we would let them know how they could contribute and certainly they did their part.

This was an issue because some of the group members did not live on campus and could not meet up as easily as others. Our group tried to meet up around once a week so that we did not fall behind on anything or leave something till the end. Also, the times that some members were able to meet, others had class. Some group members also had other assignments that required a significant amount of their time. This hindered their ability to meet up during the free time that they had. The confusion caused a lot of excess work in having to plan around peoples schedules in order to find an ideal time for all group members. We were able to overcome this by meeting on more than one occasion instead of all at once. This allowed for each group member to figure out the next step with another group member. We also created a Facebook group chat to be able to communicate with each other. We used this platform to message about any questions or to discuss anything and to plan meet up times. As it was discussed during lecture, this issue is a result from the barriers of communication. When the assignment was introduced, we were forced to answer the question of what barriers of communication we might see. We thought that for sure we would encounter physical barriers. The major physical barrier we encountered was people living off campus and having trouble meeting up. When looking at how our group worked with each other, what must be considered is our utilization of the four functions of management. These four functions are: planning, organizing, controlling, and leading. When our group first met up, we realized that in order to be successful in this assignment we would need to effectively follow these four functions. Another barrier of communication that was encountered was language barrier. One of my group members was still learning

While in nursing school my group was selected to do a presentation about the African American culture. I wanted to be the leader of the presentation. When we all got together I had everyone discuss what information needed to be gathered, what resources we would use, and how we would present it. I assigned my group members roles on what parts they had to do and encouraged them to help one another out if someone was unable to find any information about their section. Over the weeks I would make sure and send out emails that consisted of additional ideas the group had, information that could be useful for the presentation, and followed up with everyone. Before we were going to present I set up group meetings so that we could organize the presentation

For example, we all have similar communication styles. None of us has a confrontational style, so there were no altercations. Sasha was the most outgoing member of the group in general, and sometimes she had to actively encourage some of the other members to speak up if she could tell there was something bothering them or if they did not understand what they were supposed to do. Otherwise, we all felt comfortable enough to share our concerns. We did not pick a group leader so much, but Sasha sometimes took charge of the discussions we had. This gave us some kind of focus, but generally we had a democratic group and collaborated continually. We brainstormed together often, such as when we came up with the keywords for researching the databases.

I facilitated the third session as the group entered into the middle phase of the group process. In the middle phase the group focused on getting the work done (Shulman, 2012). All of the group members, both have things in

I believe my group and I rose to the challenge of having a more hands on approach to group work. This collaborative effort undeniably pushed my current group work skills and discipline, due to previous experiences in group work consisting of a maximum of 2 meetings, often weeks apart. I definitely feel as if my professional experience and knowledge of skills when completing joint work have been improved because of it.

The first was getting a scheduled time that worked for absolutely everyone. I don’t believe I was till the last two or three weeks that we had a group meeting that worked for everyone to show up. Most of the time people were going to come late or couldn’t make it because of previous commitments like a job. Thankfully in the end the project became more of a priority. As we all learned and memorized our lines by ourselves, we put attitude and movement to it as a group. One time there was class time of almost an hour to work on our plays and every group left expect for ours. We took it upon ourselves to practice in the space we were to eventually preform in and you gave us helpful feedback to each character that allowed us to make the play even better. The second hardest part of our group meetings were that because we bonded so well together we always had a rough time of getting down to work. The first 45 minutes of every group meeting was spent just catching

Also, as a group we have to work and complete our presentation, and divide the work.

During the process of forming the outline and the PowerPoint, each other’s progress as well as competence was able to be measured and observed. We were able to critique each other’s work and build upon what each member already developed. Yet during the actual performance of the presentation, regardless of how much preparation or practice, what was delivered was what you got. There was no turn around point. This stress of the possibility of making a mistake at that point put not only a higher level of dependence on one another, but trust. Trust allowed the dependence to occur in the beginning. Aside interdependence I would say that synergy amongst the group stayed positive and constant throughout the group and the entirety of the project. Our ability to communicate what main ideas we thought would be pertinent to share in the presentation and who would be sharing which part happened with ease. With regards to equability, this stems back to the level of trust and interdependence the group had when it came to what specific information each group member chose as well as how it would be announced. Moreover, to the topic of openness. This I feel helped the group keep its homeostasis. Granted there was a lot of freedom to how each group member would select their information and how they would present, each member of the group seemed to be open to critique and feedback. We were all able to provide suggestions to each other as well as what we felt best for the presentation without the friction. The concept of groupthink did not affect the group and the overall morale stayed

Working in a group can be very difficult at times. Different people with different views may not always agree which one another. Throughout the various task I played the communicator. I made sure everyone was on track on what we wanted to do. I also made sure people was okay and happy in the role they was playing in the group. My group worked together in collecting ideas from one another and making it into one.

I have been apart of many “groups” throughout my high school and college years and I have enjoyed and learned many different things from each one. One group in particular in which I learned a lot and was able to gain many skills was from my “core group”. I was a New Student Orientation Assistant (NSOA) when entering my sophomore year at Eastern. NSOAs assist the new students with their transition to Eastern. There were over 150 of us students that were divided into core groups. I was with my core group for five days and with them throughout those days for more than 12 hours. Through those long training days, we learned a lot about one another. As a group, we bonded and were able to successfully complete the First Four training and orientation.