-> An important factor would seem to me the paring up of group members.
-> How can one avoid a "bad mix?"  I think of my college days where we
-> did group assignments and some members were just along for the ride.
There are several ways of dealing with this.
One thing that is probably often overlooked by instructors when they try
a "cooperative learning" activity, is time after the activity for the
group to do "processing and evaluation".
I don't always do group processing in my classes, but I try to at least
have the students till out individual evaluations. I don't always give
everyone in a group the same grade. I have the students report
confidentially, what percentage of the work was done by each group
member and adjust the grades accordingly.
One suggestion that I've heard before (but have never tried myself) is
telling the group that they have earned a certain amount of points for
the activity, and they must decide among themselves how to divide it up.
They should not necessarily be divided up equally, but rather to reflect
how much each member contributed to the group's solution.
I have other tactics that I use to ensure (on short, 1 day class
activities) that no one gets a "free ride".
Sheila
--- PCBoard (R) v15.22/M 10
---------------