There is no ‘I’ in team :Within a school, care should be taken to form groups wisely so that students, teachers and administrators function efficiently and effectively

Within a school, care should be taken to form groups wisely so that students, teachers and administrators function efficiently and effectively

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Devi Kar   |   TT  |  14.06.22  : Scott Tannenbaum, the president of The Group for Organizational Effectiveness, claims that “research indicates that collaborative problem-solving leads to better outcomes.” However, many have pointed out that outcomes are determined by the  nature  of the group. 

Some years ago, I was strongly impacted by something a guest speaker said on the occasion of a school prize distribution ceremony. The speaker, Dr Abhijit Sen, said that while congratulations were due to each of the winners, only individuals who were part of a collaborative group would succeed in life. Ever since, I have thought about the effectiveness of group work in schools. Here, it would be useful to remember that teams and groups have different meanings. A group has been defined as ‘a collection of individuals who co-ordinate their efforts’ while a team is ‘a group of people who share a common goal’.

In the classroom, we teachers have observed that if groups are composed well, members will learn from one another willingly and produce good work collectively. Even so, there are complaints that at least one member of the group remains idle and is quite happy to let others do all the work. At other times, there are complaints that a particular group member keeps imposing his or her ideas on the others. Real learning happens when group dynamics are permitted to operate freely. Therefore, it is erroneous to believe that one-on-one learning is always the most effective because attention is not divided.

Teachers, too, work in groups. Indeed, a big school is likely to have several formal groups. Typically, there would be groups comprising subject teachers and teachers of different segments, such as primary, middle, secondary or higher secondary school departments. In addition, there is likely to be an administration team, constituting the heads of departments, coordinators, principal and vice-principal. Subject teachers plan their work together, while the periodic meetings of the admin team help in the continuous assessment of the functioning of each department and of the school as a whole. Besides, the meetings help in the general understanding of school policy and in maintaining a consistent approach to the curriculum. The flip side is that individuality may get suppressed and there may be a tendency to hold meetings unnecessarily.

Working in groups is essential, but there must be caution against  groupthink. This phenomenon was popularised by the social psychologist, Irving L. Janis, in his book, Victims of Groupthink. In groupthink, members of a group tend to conform to the opinion of the majority instead of forming or expressing their own thoughts and ideas. In such cases, group harmony is considered more important than individual creativity. Often a charismatic or authoritarian leader imposes his or her ideas on other members of the group and this is deceptively termed ‘democratic’.

Any discussion about groups today would be incomplete without WhatsApp groups. A particular WhatsApp group that works in a strangely anonymous manner is that of ‘class mothers’. I believe it is mandatory for the mother of a school-going child to belong to such a group, where the stated objective is sharing of information. But almost every such group degenerates into a channel where mothers vent their disapproval of their offspring’s teachers and school policy in general. However, in spite of the fiery exchanges, the group itself remains quite impotent. In fact, some of the students express embarrassment about their mothers’ school-bashing activities. ‘WhatsApp mothers’ don’t really bother the school as school authorities deal with parents who communicate with them frankly and courteously.  But within the school, care should be taken to form groups wisely so that students, teachers and administrators function efficiently and effectively. Also, groupism must be guarded against.

What about people who prefer to work alone? The relevant authority must understand when to encourage an individual to collaborate and when to let him or her work on her own.

(Devi Kar is director, Modern High School for Girls, Calcutta)