Of the five groups working on semester long projects, two were not completely functional, although for very different reasons. Jill and Bill were not particularly compatible in the way they worked, thought, and did mathematics. The other group got along well personally (at least at the beginning of the course), but their interactional styles were not particularly good. This group consisted of Ellen, Mary, and Teri. I worried about both of these groups from early on in the class. In this piece I will concentrate on the group of Ellen, Mary, and Teri.
The purpose of this snapshot is to discuss the factors that led to the groups difficulties, to discuss what I did in terms of grades on the group project, to analyze what happened, to discuss how this affected the classroom behavior of the students involved, and to suggest other measures I might have tried in trying to make the group more successful.