Challenges of Group Work

We have accomplished a few projects in CALL class this semester. Most of them need students work together by commenting others' draft, recording the podcast, and answering the questions. I think we have met three main kinds of problems.

The first main kind of problem is that we were not able divide the work well. For example, in the project "My Podcast", my teammate and I didn't make an agreement on the places where we were going to write at the beginning. We wasted a lot of time there, and I even typed for him. We didn't organize well, so our first draft failed.

The second main kind of problem is that we didn't comment parnters' first draft very accurately. Each time when we were reading the partners' passage, it seemed that we knew all of them. In fact, we only got the main idea of them. Then I didn't how to comment on their passages, positive, negative or neutral. My inaccurate comments cannot help my partner make a good revision.

The last main kind of problem is that we were not able to record our voice very well. In some case, this kind of problem is more likely the personal issue. However, each time when we made a mistake while recording, we had to stop it and rerecord it. It cost lots of time. What's more, I cannot understand my partners very well. For instance, in the project "Podcast Slideshow", I didn't listen to my partner's voice very clearly in some places. Then I asked her what were them.

Since we met these problems, we didn't even get very good solutions about them. I think the best way to solve this problem is to improve our English level first. What we need to focus on is the division of labor, which we should make everyone's job more clearly and each of us make sure his best work. Maybe, we also need to practise and go over again and again on the project. The last thing as well as very important thing is the positive attitude.