Group Work

1. Group Work CSCI102 - Introduction to Information Technology B ITCS905 - Fundamentals of Information Technology

2. Overview • Group development • Group roles • Effective groups • Report components

3. Group Development • Groups generally pass through the following stages • Forming • Storming • Norming • Performing • Mourning

4. Forming – What does the group need • Clear goals and objectives • Definition of tasks and roles • Clear work plans • To know what information is required • An identification of group behaviour, standards and norms and ways to handle behaviour problems

5. Forming – Group members feelings • Demonstrate excitement • Participate hesitantly • Show tentative attachment to the group • Intellectualise • Discuss symptoms or problems peripheral to the task • Be suspicious, fearful and/or anxious about the new situation • Accomplish minimal work

6. Storming • You may find that you and/or other group members exhibit • Infighting • Doubts about success • Low group morale • Polarisation of group members • Concern about excessive work • Disunity, increased tension and jealousy

7. Storming • You and/or other group members may • Set unrealistic goals • Resist the task demands • Establish a pecking order • Criticise group leaders or other group members • Complain

8. Norming – What Are the Rules of the Group? • You and/or other group members may • Attempt to achieve maximum harmony by avoiding conflict • Develop a high level of trust • Confide in each other, share personal problems and discuss group dynamics • Express emotions constructively • Form friendships • Develop a sense of team cohesion with a common spirit and goal • Have high group morale • Establish and maintain group boundaries • Accomplish a moderate amount of work

9. Performing • You and/or other group members may • Experience insight • Be willing to sort through group problems • Understand members strengths and weaknesses • Confide in each other, share personal problems and discuss group dynamics • Undertake constructive self change • Identify closely with the group

10. Mourning • You and/or other group members may: • Feel elated at the successful attainment of goals • Feel disappointed at unattained goals • Feel a sense of loss when the group is disbanded • Feel relief at the end of the process • Congratulate each other • Celebrate

11. Roles in the Group • Individuals within a team all have unique skills and strengths • An effective team does well because of the combined input of ALL its members • Any individual team member can play a number of different roles within the team

12. Roles in the Group • Roles are predetermined behaviours expected of people in a group • Some roles will feel natural - "I'm always the one who . . . " there will be other roles, however, which may be difficult, eg chairperson or presenter. Try and develop as many unfamiliar roles as possible

13. Roles in the Group • There are four main types of roles: • Task roles • Functional roles • Maintenance roles and • Dysfunctional roles

14. Task Roles • Some of the tasks you may need to do include: • Obtaining photographs • Preparing notes • Doing calculations • Evaluating data • Obtaining references • Preparing presentations

15. You may find yourself taking on such roles as: Coordinator Initiator Information seeker Information giver Opinion seeker Opinion giver Goal setter Deadline setter Progress monitor Evaluator Clarifier Summariser Decision pusher Planner Spokesperson Troubleshooter Diagnosor Functional roles

16. Maintenance roles • You may find that your personal skills lend themselves to one or more of the following maintenance roles: • Encourager • Gatekeeper • Standards setter • Consensus tester • Mediator • Tension reliever • Listener • Volunteer

17. Some of these roles include: being aggressive blocking or nit-picking competing back stabbing seeking sympathy clowning or joking to disrupt the work of the group withdrawal being sarcastic or cynical blaming taking all the credit dominating manipulating. Dysfunctional roles

18. Features of effective teams • The features of a team which is effective in what it does and how it does it include: • combined group effort • clear goals setting • achieving a learning orientation • mutual trust and support • open communication • democratic processes

19. Report Writing • Writing reports • Introduction • The intent of the report • Basic report structure • The body of the report • Presentation • Conclusions • Recommendations • References and Bibliography

20. Introduction • Any report needs some clear guidelines: • Why are you writing the report? (the purpose) • Who will read the report? (the audience) • What will it cover? (the scope) • How will this be conveyed? (clear language, logical progression of topics, use of figures, tables, equations, appendices, references, etc) • When is it required? (time management) • Where is it required? (physical location)

21. Basic Report Structure • The following components are present in almost all reports: • Title page (including Authors) • Table of contents • Summary or Executive Summary • Introduction • Chapters of detail • Conclusions and Recommendations • List of References or Bibliography • Appendices

22. Introduction • the Introduction covers the following issues: • what was the problem and its context, • why was it a problem, • how was the problem solved (briefly).

23. Body of the Report • The body of the report must address: • Why was the study necessary? (the purpose) • When, where, how and by whom the study was conducted? • What were the findings? • What conclusions were drawn? • What recommendations were made?

24. The Body of the Report • The body of the report contains the main thrust of your argument, and is normally made up of an Introduction, a number of chapters, plus Conclusions and possibly Recommendations.

25. Conclusions and Recommendations • Your report will typically describe some findings which have been derived from • Observation • Experiment • Calculation • Literature review • From these findings, you should draw some conclusions

26. Conclusions and Recommendations • The insights that you can extract from your basic findings are a key part of your report • You may also be expected to make some recommendations based on your conclusions • The findings are the foundations on which the conclusions rest, while the conclusions, in turn, support the recommendation