Groupwork or Group Work?

Chapter one: “Groupwork as a Strategy for Classrooms”

         In this chapter of Designing Groupwork, Elizabeth Cohen highlights the importance of integrating groupwork within classroom curriculum. She asserts that groupwork is actually a form of active learning, rather than passive, as some people might label it. Furthermore, she declares that groupwork allows “students to talk together,” which in turn equates to more learning. One point that I found interesting was how Cohen states that the methods utilized to integrate groupwork are transferable. I thought that was interesting because I did not experience much groupwork during my undergraduate career, and I wonder why professors stay away from assigning group projects, especially in my discipline of Writing and Literature? It would have been interesting to partake in groupwork for those courses.

Chapter two: “Why Groupwork?”

         Cohen accentuates the positive impact of groupwork on the individual student in chapter two of Designing Groupwork. While some may argue that groupwork is ineffective and a misuse of time, Cohen points out that students who participate in properly developed groupwork projects will improve higher-order thinking, sharpen basic skills such as the retention and understanding of material, practice their oral communication skills, and further develop interpersonal skills—abilities which are critical even outside of school, in a real-world context (14-17). To help students reach their potential in these areas, Cohen asserts that teachers must utilize conceptual learning (8-9). This struck my curiosity because I haven’t seen a lot of conceptual learning in the classroom. It makes me wonder if that is because teachers are pressured to teach students how to take standardized tests? I’m an advocate for teaching higher-order thinking and problem-solving skills, so my second question: how do I do that? Why haven’t we covered this topic outside of theory and been presented useful practices?

Chapter three: “The Dilemma of Groupwork”

         It is in chapter three of, Designing Groupwork, that Cohen decides to tackle the expected criticisms of groupwork. Rather than arguing point for point why groupwork sometimes doesn’t work, Cohen gives a sociological explanation. She describes “status ordering” or social ranking as the dominant issue that infects viable groupwork and identifies several forms of it, such as expert status, academic status, peer status, and societal status (27-32). Social ranking seems inevitable yet unpredictable, according to the nature of the task presented to a group. Cohen defends groupwork as a chance for students to work past social expectations and gives students “the chance to talk, interact, and contribute” (36). Furthermore, Cohen states that groupwork will improve test scores, teach students how to treat each other as individuals rather than labels, challenge cultural prejudices, and offer an equal opportunity for all students to contribute to class (36-37).

At this point, I’m wondering why I keep spelling groupwork as one word? I’ve always spelled it (and been taught to spell it) as two words: group work, or maybe even hyphenated, group-work. However, Cohen decides to challenge this tradition and smashes it all together as groupwork. It may sound silly but this acknowledgment is somewhat symbolic: groupwork essentially is about working together, not working individually to eventually just submit a final product together. There is a certain cohesiveness to groupwork that doesn’t exist in group work.