HS teachers that give group projects

[Anonymous]

I just tell my kids to suck it up. Don't rat out another kid, but if if they give an option between group and individual or let you chose your partners, think hard about what you want to do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I refuse to give group projects. It means I have to grade 4x as many submissions, but I don't feel right allowing any student to get marks for another student's ability/knowledge.

Any assessment is individual, completed in class only so that mom/dad can't do it and Johnny can't have Jimmy do his work.

In English, collaborative work is in the SOL framework. It’s a standard they’re supposed to cover. We do all the group work in class because they’re not large projects and this way we know the parents didn’t do and the kids have to have accountability for how they participated and showed up in their group. But it’s an important skill for them to learn.

[Anonymous]

50% of the work giving in ECON AND PERSONAL FIN are group projects.

[Anonymous]

Most teachers know. when they assign a group project, who is going to do all of the work and who isn’t. It’s a big deal to the parent and the kid who have to see this all play out over the course of the project. But in 90% of the groups, the teacher already knows who is doing the heavy lifting and who is on a smoke break.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Most teachers know. when they assign a group project, who is going to do all of the work and who isn’t. It’s a big deal to the parent and the kid who have to see this all play out over the course of the project. But in 90% of the groups, the teacher already knows who is doing the heavy lifting and who is on a smoke break.

Yet, they always get A

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Most teachers know. when they assign a group project, who is going to do all of the work and who isn’t. It’s a big deal to the parent and the kid who have to see this all play out over the course of the project. But in 90% of the groups, the teacher already knows who is doing the heavy lifting and who is on a smoke break.

I'm willing to accept that the parents who are encouraging/supporting the stressed out kids sort of don't matter in this scenario. But the kids to whom it is a big deal? Don't they and their stress levels of doing 2-4 people's work on top of maintaining their academic excellence they expect in other classes matter?

Sure it's life. Sure they'll have to do this on the job too. But does that make it OK to do at 14-18?

[Anonymous]

Deal with it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A kind HS teachers gives kids the option to work in a group or alone. My son always chooses alone. It's the same effort either way, why boost up some other kid and stress.

When they get to college, they may run into trouble if they don;t know how to handle group projects (depending on their major).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A kind HS teachers gives kids the option to work in a group or alone. My son always chooses alone. It's the same effort either way, why boost up some other kid and stress.

When they get to college, they may run into trouble if they don;t know how to handle group projects (depending on their major).

+1. Parents are so worried about their little kid not getting a perfect grade instead of letting them learn a very important life skill, which is how to work with others. Parents worry about the dumbest S.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I refuse to give group projects. It means I have to grade 4x as many submissions, but I don't feel right allowing any student to get marks for another student's ability/knowledge.

Any assessment is individual, completed in class only so that mom/dad can't do it and Johnny can't have Jimmy do his work.

In English, collaborative work is in the SOL framework. It’s a standard they’re supposed to cover. We do all the group work in class because they’re not large projects and this way we know the parents didn’t do and the kids have to have accountability for how they participated and showed up in their group. But it’s an important skill for them to learn.

I hope the poster who thinks it's about "kind" or "unkind" teachers reads this.

A lot of people would be shocked by how little autonomy teachers in certain grades/subjects/districts have.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I refuse to give group projects. It means I have to grade 4x as many submissions, but I don't feel right allowing any student to get marks for another student's ability/knowledge.

Any assessment is individual, completed in class only so that mom/dad can't do it and Johnny can't have Jimmy do his work.

In English, collaborative work is in the SOL framework. It’s a standard they’re supposed to cover. We do all the group work in class because they’re not large projects and this way we know the parents didn’t do and the kids have to have accountability for how they participated and showed up in their group. But it’s an important skill for them to learn.

I hope the poster who thinks it's about "kind" or "unkind" teachers reads this.

A lot of people would be shocked by how little autonomy teachers in certain grades/subjects/districts have.

Yes I have autonomy in HOW I teach and assess collaboration and speaking and listening skills but I have to teach them. I am not familiar with other content standards but I wouldn’t be surprised if collaboration and communication skills are embedded in all of them at all grade levels. It’s a pretty important thing to learn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I refuse to give group projects. It means I have to grade 4x as many submissions, but I don't feel right allowing any student to get marks for another student's ability/knowledge.

Any assessment is individual, completed in class only so that mom/dad can't do it and Johnny can't have Jimmy do his work.

In English, collaborative work is in the SOL framework. It’s a standard they’re supposed to cover. We do all the group work in class because they’re not large projects and this way we know the parents didn’t do and the kids have to have accountability for how they participated and showed up in their group. But it’s an important skill for them to learn.

It’s not. It’s really not. I know someone somewhere in the school admin org chart thinks this, but it’s not true. Kids need to learn how to produce good work on their own. Group projects teaches slackers how to slack. That’s all that comes out of it, and that isn’t good for anyone. It’s not good for the slacker, and it’s not good for the kid who has to pick up their slack. It doesn’t teach them how to function in the real world. It teaches them behaviors that will get them fired.

It does reduce the amount of grading that teachers have to do, and I get that our teachers are over worked, but forcing kids to do group projects is not the solution to that problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I refuse to give group projects. It means I have to grade 4x as many submissions, but I don't feel right allowing any student to get marks for another student's ability/knowledge.

Any assessment is individual, completed in class only so that mom/dad can't do it and Johnny can't have Jimmy do his work.

In English, collaborative work is in the SOL framework. It’s a standard they’re supposed to cover. We do all the group work in class because they’re not large projects and this way we know the parents didn’t do and the kids have to have accountability for how they participated and showed up in their group. But it’s an important skill for them to learn.

It’s not. It’s really not. I know someone somewhere in the school admin org chart thinks this, but it’s not true. Kids need to learn how to produce good work on their own. Group projects teaches slackers how to slack. That’s all that comes out of it, and that isn’t good for anyone. It’s not good for the slacker, and it’s not good for the kid who has to pick up their slack. It doesn’t teach them how to function in the real world. It teaches them behaviors that will get them fired.

It does reduce the amount of grading that teachers have to do, and I get that our teachers are over worked, but forcing kids to do group projects is not the solution to that problem.

Wow. I disagree with this.

I have to work collaboratively every day at my job with some really difficult people.

But I remember this dynamic from high school, and I remember what my business teacher taught me then: getting the job done is what’s most important. And good leaders figure out how to motivate the slackers.

And I was hired at my current job because of my reputation for doing this well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid who is studious and conscientious really dislikes group projects. He usually ends up doing most of the project. He especially despises when the teacher groups him with 1-2 students who do nothing to very little instead of having the students who are hard working grouped together.

Teachers almost always tell the class they can see who is doing the work and who isn't and they are going to grade accordingly. It never seems to happen. If anyone in my son's group ever complains to the teacher the teacher says some BS about in the real world you have to learn to work together so they have to deal with it. At times my son has lost points because he asked the teacher what to do if someone says they are going to turn in their part but then never does after the group members beg the student to complete the work.

How do I know the slacker kids get the grade as the student who has put in all the hours? I have another child who is the slacker. He is a bright but does the minimal. He often seem to find a group to join with a Type A girl. From the get go he goes up and tells her he is willing to relinquish all control to her and she can do the whole thing and he will stay out of her way. He is good at presenting so he says he will present whatever she writes up for him if there is a presentation.

Slacker son also chooses a student whose parents with advanced degrees do the work for the student so they get the best grade. Those parents really like my slacker kid because he is willing to go along with not doing anything but is smart enough to be able to answer questions if asked and not tell anyone the parents are really doing the work. So he ends up getting A's for doing absolutely nothing.

Your slacker son is going to be a CEO some day. I am one of those Type A girls, still at the bottom of the hierarchy. It's actually amazing how people have this kind of intuition so young.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I refuse to give group projects. It means I have to grade 4x as many submissions, but I don't feel right allowing any student to get marks for another student's ability/knowledge.

Any assessment is individual, completed in class only so that mom/dad can't do it and Johnny can't have Jimmy do his work.

In English, collaborative work is in the SOL framework. It’s a standard they’re supposed to cover. We do all the group work in class because they’re not large projects and this way we know the parents didn’t do and the kids have to have accountability for how they participated and showed up in their group. But it’s an important skill for them to learn.

It’s not. It’s really not. I know someone somewhere in the school admin org chart thinks this, but it’s not true. Kids need to learn how to produce good work on their own. Group projects teaches slackers how to slack. That’s all that comes out of it, and that isn’t good for anyone. It’s not good for the slacker, and it’s not good for the kid who has to pick up their slack. It doesn’t teach them how to function in the real world. It teaches them behaviors that will get them fired.

It does reduce the amount of grading that teachers have to do, and I get that our teachers are over worked, but forcing kids to do group projects is not the solution to that problem.

We do both. Obviously the kids are expected to produce most of their work on their own. However, the function of a group project is that children actually do build understanding and create connections when they share ideas with one another. They’re taught and instructed to build upon, test, and refine each other's ideas. Anyone who has ever raised kids or seen them interact in any environment understands that they actually learn best when they work on a skill together and share their learning. For me, it doesn’t reduce my grading AT ALL, not one single bit, to have the kids work collaboratively on something. I still have to assess each of them individually three separate times - in the planning, creation, and presentation spheres - and provide feedback, and guidance, and assistance to each group as they go. You don’t like group work so you want to believe we do it out of laziness or that it isn’t valuable in distinct ways but that’s simply not true.