4. Goal setting is a responsibility that I share because I am part of a group. The entire group needs to work together in order to accomplish many things. Yes each person within a group may have responsibilities of their own, but they always should relate back to the group. Our whole group needs to come up with a goal together. If I did that by myself, the group might not agree, and I would be acting selfishly.
5. I am just going to assume what marshalling means, because I am not sure I have a clear definition. But I think I have been instrumental in collecting, and researching resources for the benefit of the group. I have done my part as a group member, to read all the articles Steph has supplied, as well as research the wiki page. I make sure that I know what is going on in class so that I can help myself, as well as help the group that I am involved in.
7. I am technically taking this class to help me achieve my bachelors degree in Communications. This class is to my benefit, and has helped me academically and will hopefully be useful to me in the future, after I graduate. While being in the class, and working in a group, my needs have changed. I realize that by being selfish and doing the work that I need to do and want to do, I will not take from this class the things that Steph is trying to teach us. In order to do well in this class, I am assuming, I need to be conscious of the people I am working with in a group. I feel that if I take into account the articles and subjects we have been studying and apply them to our group work in class, and complete the work, I will get a passing grade.
10. Our group has all the roles necessary to achieve optimum group growth and productivity. We have analyzed group activity, by observing it, and by participating in it. I think at this point, we all know what it takes to make an effective group. I feel that if we were given a different problem to solve, or needed to make a group decision, we would have a much easier time doing that now than before when we first entered the class. I do not think it would be easy, and I think we would all still learn much more about our group and ourselves by doing so. Each decision made is a learning experience. We are definitely prepared to make decisions.
11. I believe that our group has generated effective work on the problem of role-requiredness. We have all fulfilled the need of roles whether we have blatantly noticed it or not. In each fishbowl we have had there is usually someone who leads the discussion, someone who encourages discussion, the observer, follower, etc. I think our bigger problem is being able to identify which role a person is playing. But I think that we all have been subconsciously playing a role.
14. I am unsure of how to diagnose role requirements needed by my sub-group team. I think that the Part A of our assignment has greatly helped me with the required roles in a group. I think it is helpful to look at a situation, or comments that are familiar to you, and then try and diagnose each role. With time, and usage of these roles, I think it will become easier to identify these roles.
15. I have role flexibility. Depending on the subject that we are talking about changes the role that I decide to play in a group. For example, when we are discussing the lay out of the main page of the Wiki, I have great interest in this subject. I chose to be more involved and I suspect I chose to be an opinion giver. I had a lot of ideas that I wanted to share with the group, so I did. Another example, in the class when we were discussing with John Robison I chose to be a group-observer and commentator. That day I was not feeling up to participating a great deal, verbally anyway. So I chose to observe the group discussion, and made some of my own conclusions in my head. The last example is in our study abroad group I sometimes chose to be an encourager. After Tony had completed his work and gave his opinion about our page, I was complimentary towards his contribution. It was a very positive experience, because we both had similar ideas, but I feel when working closely with one other person it is important to be accepting of their ideas and suggestions.
16. The three roles I flex among the most are opinion giver, procedural technician, and the group-observer and commentator. By decision to flex is based upon what the group needs, and how the group molds to fit those needs. If there is another person who shows the desire to be the opinion giver, I might chose to be an observer for that portion of the time. I feel that it is ineffective to have every person in one group share the same role. If everyone in the group was an opinion giver, I do not think we would progress very well. An example of flexibility is when in class we decide it is important for someone to record things on the board, and act as the procedural technician, if someone else volunteers for the job, I will not. Instead I will take on a different role within the group.
18. There is definitely tension in the class at times. I think this tension exists when there are too many people playing the same role. This tension can happen at the beginning of a group meeting when people are still trying to figure which role they want to fulfill. Sometimes this tension gets smoothed out when people calm down and figure out which role they choose. Other times this tension only grows stronger when people become stubborn and aren’t willing to be flexible in their role.
