Group assignment

Reflections on Group cooperation

The current situation of group cooperation 👍

The traditional learning methods in China are influenced by Confucian culture, emphasizing individual efforts. Students are mostly accustomed to passive learning and often play the role of obedience in group assignments, with relatively weak spontaneous leadership and problem-solving abilities (Lau & Jin, 2019). Unlike China, the educational concept in the UK attaches great importance to the cultivation of students' comprehensive qualities. The abilities such as communication, collaboration and problem-solving advocated by cooperative learning are highly consistent with the educational goals in the UK (Cowie 1995).

How did we choose this title: Supporting Chinese Students in Adapting to UK student-centered Learning  😈

When the members of our group first discussed this topic, the progress was not particularly smooth because everyone felt a bit at a loss about this kind of group cooperation. This is different from the previous learning experience in China where teachers assigned tasks and students only needed to complete them as required. We need to design the links and contents of the entire task. However, the leader of our group first broke through this obstacle, expressing his understanding and planning of the task. As a result, everyone followed suit and joined the discussion. So the members reached a consensus very soon. Because all of our team members are Chinese international students, when they enter the UK for study, the first thing they face is the difference between the education systems of the two countries. The UK emphasizes student-centered teaching methods, while China emphasizes teacher-led teaching methods. These two teaching methods are essentially very different, which has had a significant impact on Chinese students who have just arrived in the uk. Our group hopes that through this group task, we can help the next batch of Chinese students who have just come to the uk relieve their study pressure and anxiety. For this purpose, we have designed a set of specialized solutions.

Design of our group work  😊

The task allocation among members plays an important role in group cooperation. In this teamwork, I was mainly responsible for

a)👉 An interpretation based on vedio

I hope to explore the implicit information, background knowledge, etc. in the video to help the audience understand the logic and principles behind the video content. For instance, the video mentioned that Chinese international students are not good at expressing objections in public. The explanation can be analyzed in depth to identify the root causes of the differences behind it. At the same time, guide the audience to think about the video content from different perspectives, enhance their thinking level, and stimulate their interest in further exploration.

b) 👉Explain the reasons for watching

I hope that through explanation, learners can clearly know what they can gain from watching the video, help them judge whether the video is meaningful for their own learning, and avoid blind viewing. At the same time, explaining the reasons for watching can attract the target group with genuine needs and increase the dissemination rate of the video.

What we get from our cooperation and group work  😎

In group cooperation, we may have differences due to some differences in opinions. During this process, each group member tried to refute the other side with more convincing reasons. I think this process is very interesting. At the same time, the handling methods when facing differences, I think, can better serve the students who come to study in the uk later.

When assigning tasks, the initial members of the team had different ideas. XinYi Gao and XiaoHui Dai suggested making short videos to present the emotional journey of adapting to the new educational culture in a more formal way. YiRu Li proposed to record a personal video blog to document her learning experiences, believing that journal-style records are more approachable and can make it easier for viewers to connect with their own experiences and feel the challenges when they first came to the uk. However, after discussion, everyone felt that personal video blogs might be lengthy and the content scattered, which did not conform to the project goals. To highlight the key points and facilitate dissemination, it was ultimately decided to produce short videos with a professional style. After clarifying the direction, the team allocates tasks according to the advantages of the members. During the process of completing the task, everyone kept organizing meetings to ensure the consistency of their positions.

Facing these differences, we solve them in this way:

👀1.While expressing their clear ideas, group members listen carefully to others' ideas and reasons, and identify the main points of contention

👀2. Return to the initial goal of group cooperation, clarify the direction of everyone's joint efforts, and encourage them to break away from the original thinking mode and explore more feasible solutions

👀3. During this process, in order to reach a consensus, members sometimes appropriately adjust their positions, with the aim of advancing the project progress more quickly

Just as (Guerrero et al., 2000) said, group cooperation can promote the improvement of collaborative skills and communication. Meanwhile, in group cooperation, individuals and members support each other and work together towards the goal, which can enhance a sense of belonging. Finally, in the process of solving problems through group cooperation, individuals can be exposed to the viewpoints and ideas of different members, broadening their perspectives on understanding the problems.

                

Reference list  👄

Guerrero, L. A., Alarcón, R., Collazos, C., Pino, J. A., & Fuller, D. A. (2000). Evaluating cooperation in group work. In Proceedings Sixth International Workshop on Groupware. CRIWG 2000 (pp. 28 - 35). IEEE.

Lau, K.H. & Jin, Q. (2019) ‘Chinese students’ group work performance: does team personality composition matter?’, Education & training (London), 61(3), pp. 290–309.

Cowie, H. (1995). Cooperative group work: A perspective from the UK. International Journal of Educational Research, 23(3), 227 - 238.

Ai Statement

For this blog, I used chat gpt to help me summarize the literature content, finely divide the key parts in the article, and improve the logical analysis. Use Doubao to help me generate pictures. The final content has been reviewed and edited to ensure academic originality and completeness