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Why do teachers always think group projects and in-class demonstrations are great ideas? I hated that as a student. I found those classes to be really shallow,

Why do teachers always think group projects and in-class demonstrations are great ideas? I hated that as a student. I found those classes to be really shallow, because groups of students rarely had good ideas or grasped the material well enough to present on it. A good teacher can spend a whole class lecturing and is able to engage their students. We don't need to fix class structure. We need to fix teachers.

DelightOne 9y ago
I rather think tools need to improve. Could you do without a teacher? That should be the goal. To be able to simply take ur tablet out, and learn and have fun doing it, to discover and practise, as to get the knowledge into you while enjoying the experience. I think that should be the goal, because then you will do it again and again on your own. Why do you like computer games so much? Cause its fun! That should be the goal im my humble opinion. Get students to learn all day long while enjoying it and being productive without teachers, so to make the learning success independent of the teachers and tests, whereby the students all the while learn more than they would on a test.
Consultant32452 9y ago
Because you get group projects at work, And the groups at work rarely have good ideas or grasp material well enough to work on it.
- thatswrong0 9y ago
  "Group projects" at work are completely different from group projects in school. Work generally has managers. If someone isn't pulling their weight in a project, there's someone you can talk to about it and have something done about it. People have their income on the line. At school, my teachers were almost always explicit about not wanting to manage. "Organize yourselves". There were countless times I had lazy project partners, even in grad level courses in college, that I could do nothing about. The teachers told me to just figure it out myself. They never took action against bums. This meant that lazy people could assume they'd be taken care of by their more disciplined teammates. As a result, I never got any value out of group projects in school - whenever I had a group project, I always assumed I'd have to be doing _way more_ work than I'd have to for individual projects. I've never had to deal with coworkers who acted that way.
  - Consultant32452 9y ago
    You've never had incompetent coworkers? You've never worked at a megacorp where it was basically impossible to get fired? One of the things you could've done for your group projects is be the manager yourself. Assign tasks and divvy up the work load based on skill/knowledge. Obviously, don't give the doofus anything challenging. 99% of the time people are willing to do whatever they're explicitly instructed to do. Track assigned tasks and completion. If someone doesn't pull their weight, don't put their name on the finished project and turn in the assignment tracking with the project to explain why their name was removed.
    - thatswrong0 9y ago
      I would never work at a megacorp. That sounds miserable. And why are you assuming I didn't try managing projects? Of course I did. I would always divvy up the work in such a way that'd I'd have the more difficult portion and I'd keep tabs on people. And when I'd tell my teachers that someone wasn't pulling their weight, they'd say it's my problem. I took _one_ class in college where the professors actually took that into account and docked my teammates. Without threats from teachers, students do not give a fuck. Complete waste of my time in school.
      - Consultant32452 9y ago
        Apparently you failed to motivate your classmates. How often did you not put someone's name on the finished project?
  - VLM 9y ago
    Consider bigger companies where the enemies of middle managers are all other internal departments. Technically IT and engineering work for the same company. In practice you're more likely to get cooperation with a competitor company. I'm not exaggerating in that its easier to serve on standards committees than to get an exception to "policy" from another department. The "dog eat dog" happens at middle management not grunt front line level, but it's there...
- wvenable 9y ago
  Group projects at work are different because everyone has a different role. In school, everyone must have the same role in order to equally learn the material. Any divisions are arbitrary and the consequences of not putting in effort are minimal.
  - Consultant32452 9y ago
    >Any divisions are arbitrary and the consequences of not putting in effort are minimal. That's been my experience at work too. Sure, I might be a developer, but I'm often doing PM, QA, or BA tasks. Eventually crappy coworkers might get the boot, but almost never within the time frame of a single project.
    - wvenable 9y ago
      The argument is that this kind of group project arrangement is crappy; It's possible for work group projects to be terrible for the same reasons but it's absolutely guaranteed in school projects. If anything, we are just training students that your terrible group work experiences are normal.
      - Consultant32452 9y ago
        >If anything, we are just training students that your terrible group work experiences are normal. Oh, absolutely. That's what the whole school experience is about. Think about it. We sit all your desks in nice neat rows. You have to ask permission even to use the restroom. We demand conformity, maybe even put you in a uniform. Don't you dare ever question authority. Sit here quietly for hours on end doing mindless tasks for meaningless rewards. If that's not some reasonable analogy to what your job is like, then you are probably at least a standard deviation outside the norm in IQ or creativity.
- magic_beans 9y ago
  HS is not preparation for work. It would be more useful if it was, actually. But it's not, and it doesn't pretend to be. My high school had some really knowledgable and inspiring teachers (and many not so!). Some of those great teachers were able to plant seeds of thought with their lectures, and those were some of the most valuable lessons I had. I wish HS could involve inspiring, knowledgeable teachers, plus self-study in one's own intellectual interests.
  - Consultant32452 9y ago
    If you could try to be a bit more cynical you'll see that HS is preparation for most jobs. We line all your desks up in nice neat rows, conformity is mandatory so we may even put you in uniforms. We don't want you ever questioning authority. We want you to sit here quietly and do mindless work for countless hours with minimal rewards. Most jobs out there are not inspiring or in anyone's intellectual interests.
    - VLM 9y ago
      Don't forget the open office, the clock is the definition of successful working, authoritarian discipline. Add in a social / political culture that is right out of middle school behavior at the worse employers...
      - Consultant32452 9y ago
        I think if that's not what your job is like, then you're probably in the vast minority in the world, probably even in Western culture unless you're a standard deviation above the norm in IQ or generational wealth.
        white-flame 9y ago
        If you have no tolerance for such BS, you'll eventually find your place without it. There are literally millions of companies to work for, as well as other non-direct-employment opportunities which is something like 30% of the workforce now. Accepting these problems as a necessary burden is your own personal choice.
anotheryou 9y ago
I hated them too. Think of a meeting without clear hierarchy, with a random team (so no "usual roles") and the stress to handle people that are not entirely your first choice... But even more I hated psycho-games. Some rules or some concept you have to follow without being told what it is good for in the end. ("Write down whay you think about XY, now exchange these with your neighbour. I will tell you what to do with it later")

DelightOne 9y ago

I rather think tools need to improve. Could you do without a teacher? That should be the goal. To be able to simply take ur tablet out, and learn and have fun doing it, to discover and practise, as to get the knowledge into you while enjoying the experience. I think that should be the goal, because then you will do it again and again on your own. Why do you like computer games so much? Cause its fun! That should be the goal im my humble opinion. Get students to learn all day long while enjoying it and being productive without teachers, so to make the learning success independent of the teachers and tests, whereby the students all the while learn more than they would on a test.

Consultant32452 9y ago

Because you get group projects at work, And the groups at work rarely have good ideas or grasp material well enough to work on it.

thatswrong0 9y ago
"Group projects" at work are completely different from group projects in school. Work generally has managers. If someone isn't pulling their weight in a project, there's someone you can talk to about it and have something done about it. People have their income on the line. At school, my teachers were almost always explicit about not wanting to manage. "Organize yourselves". There were countless times I had lazy project partners, even in grad level courses in college, that I could do nothing about. The teachers told me to just figure it out myself. They never took action against bums. This meant that lazy people could assume they'd be taken care of by their more disciplined teammates. As a result, I never got any value out of group projects in school - whenever I had a group project, I always assumed I'd have to be doing _way more_ work than I'd have to for individual projects. I've never had to deal with coworkers who acted that way.
- Consultant32452 9y ago
  You've never had incompetent coworkers? You've never worked at a megacorp where it was basically impossible to get fired? One of the things you could've done for your group projects is be the manager yourself. Assign tasks and divvy up the work load based on skill/knowledge. Obviously, don't give the doofus anything challenging. 99% of the time people are willing to do whatever they're explicitly instructed to do. Track assigned tasks and completion. If someone doesn't pull their weight, don't put their name on the finished project and turn in the assignment tracking with the project to explain why their name was removed.
  - thatswrong0 9y ago
    I would never work at a megacorp. That sounds miserable. And why are you assuming I didn't try managing projects? Of course I did. I would always divvy up the work in such a way that'd I'd have the more difficult portion and I'd keep tabs on people. And when I'd tell my teachers that someone wasn't pulling their weight, they'd say it's my problem. I took _one_ class in college where the professors actually took that into account and docked my teammates. Without threats from teachers, students do not give a fuck. Complete waste of my time in school.
    - Consultant32452 9y ago
      Apparently you failed to motivate your classmates. How often did you not put someone's name on the finished project?
- VLM 9y ago
  Consider bigger companies where the enemies of middle managers are all other internal departments. Technically IT and engineering work for the same company. In practice you're more likely to get cooperation with a competitor company. I'm not exaggerating in that its easier to serve on standards committees than to get an exception to "policy" from another department. The "dog eat dog" happens at middle management not grunt front line level, but it's there...
wvenable 9y ago
Group projects at work are different because everyone has a different role. In school, everyone must have the same role in order to equally learn the material. Any divisions are arbitrary and the consequences of not putting in effort are minimal.
- Consultant32452 9y ago
  >Any divisions are arbitrary and the consequences of not putting in effort are minimal. That's been my experience at work too. Sure, I might be a developer, but I'm often doing PM, QA, or BA tasks. Eventually crappy coworkers might get the boot, but almost never within the time frame of a single project.
  - wvenable 9y ago
    The argument is that this kind of group project arrangement is crappy; It's possible for work group projects to be terrible for the same reasons but it's absolutely guaranteed in school projects. If anything, we are just training students that your terrible group work experiences are normal.
    - Consultant32452 9y ago
      >If anything, we are just training students that your terrible group work experiences are normal. Oh, absolutely. That's what the whole school experience is about. Think about it. We sit all your desks in nice neat rows. You have to ask permission even to use the restroom. We demand conformity, maybe even put you in a uniform. Don't you dare ever question authority. Sit here quietly for hours on end doing mindless tasks for meaningless rewards. If that's not some reasonable analogy to what your job is like, then you are probably at least a standard deviation outside the norm in IQ or creativity.
magic_beans 9y ago
HS is not preparation for work. It would be more useful if it was, actually. But it's not, and it doesn't pretend to be. My high school had some really knowledgable and inspiring teachers (and many not so!). Some of those great teachers were able to plant seeds of thought with their lectures, and those were some of the most valuable lessons I had. I wish HS could involve inspiring, knowledgeable teachers, plus self-study in one's own intellectual interests.
- Consultant32452 9y ago
  If you could try to be a bit more cynical you'll see that HS is preparation for most jobs. We line all your desks up in nice neat rows, conformity is mandatory so we may even put you in uniforms. We don't want you ever questioning authority. We want you to sit here quietly and do mindless work for countless hours with minimal rewards. Most jobs out there are not inspiring or in anyone's intellectual interests.
  - VLM 9y ago
    Don't forget the open office, the clock is the definition of successful working, authoritarian discipline. Add in a social / political culture that is right out of middle school behavior at the worse employers...
    - Consultant32452 9y ago
      I think if that's not what your job is like, then you're probably in the vast minority in the world, probably even in Western culture unless you're a standard deviation above the norm in IQ or generational wealth.
      - white-flame 9y ago
        If you have no tolerance for such BS, you'll eventually find your place without it. There are literally millions of companies to work for, as well as other non-direct-employment opportunities which is something like 30% of the workforce now. Accepting these problems as a necessary burden is your own personal choice.

anotheryou 9y ago

I hated them too. Think of a meeting without clear hierarchy, with a random team (so no "usual roles") and the stress to handle people that are not entirely your first choice... But even more I hated psycho-games. Some rules or some concept you have to follow without being told what it is good for in the end. ("Write down whay you think about XY, now exchange these with your neighbour. I will tell you what to do with it later")