<p>Do I like group projects? No
Do I like individual projects?
Do I like lengthy research papers? No
Do I like presentations? No
Do I like timed scanned exams? No</p>
<p>Basically, I don't like anything that is evaluative ;-)</p>
<p>But I think they all have a place in the high school curriculum.</p>
<p>Both of my children have benefited from one or the other. One takes tests very well, but is not very good at presentations. The other is great with projects, but has difficulty with timed tests. One appears to often know the subject so well, that they read far more into test questions than most students, and become confused by all the nuances. They dislike the "choose the best answer" type exams because they can make a case for all of the choices. I'm glad there is variety. I suppose it would be nice to have the choice of evaluative techniques, but that could become very cumbersome for teachers. In fact, many of the teachers in our school have admitted they prefer the scanned type tests which are computer graded, simply because they don't have the time to read papers!</p>
<p>I believe projects have their place in the HS curriculum. "Busy Work" should be avoided, and I'll admit that many of the projects appear to be busy work. It would be nice for teachers to coordinate the timing of major projects as well. </p>
<p>However, in my own career, nearly everything is a "group project". And, there are still those colleagues, consultants, and even bosses who do not do their share of the work! Perhaps if they had more experience with this during school, they would be better with it in the workplace?</p>
<p>Our middle school has (thank goodness) mostly gotten away from group projects that require out of school participation. I also dislike the ones that require artistic talent. The reason I've heard for group projects is that employers have said that one of the most important things in the workplace is that people work well together and group projects teach them to do that.</p>
<p>My husband does annual judging at the regional Science Fair held at Lehigh University and he thinks it's very worthwhile. He has said that it's good for striking an interest in Science for kids who might be bored with Science in general. He was very disappointed when our school pulled out of the Science Fair last year. I do think it's inappropriate for younger kids but good for HS age. Our school district used to allow kids to choose to do it as a group project or an individual one.</p>
<p>Wow, kjofkw, that was an interesting cross-post!</p>
<p>Visual projects may be tough for the artistically challenged. I can tell you that they are also a trial for the parent of an artistically competent and detail-oriented child. If D1 drew cats in elementary schools to calculate how many legs on x cats, she would be concerned about getting the whiskers right. She had to get the number of spokes right when drawing a picture of an early car. She wanted to get perspective right when she drew a room from above (elementary school, not an art class). Her third grade teacher lauded her attention to detail, but it drove me crazy. D and I have had discussions about time management and about when you need to figure out what is good enough and move on.</p>
<p>On the other hand, I have to urge D2 to be more careful and neat in her work.</p>
<p>LOL mom58, you know how psychologists will use drawings of people to determine the developmental level of a child? At such and such age, there will be fingers, more facial detail at this age and so on? I have a 20 year old that would still draw a round head, stick body, and four stick limbs--that's it, no more. He would say, what's the point, you can tell that's a person!</p>
<p>"LOL mom58, you know how psychologists will use drawings of people to determine the developmental level of a child? "</p>
<p>My four year old had a teacher who liked to give these test to her kids occassionally. The results with my son were quite amusing. She knew perfectly well he was a good reader (he brought in an anatomy textbook and used the index among other things). His drawings tended to be rudimentary. When asked about them he'd say things like "Oh the person has his back to you, that's why there is no face." He hated drawing.</p>
<p>I've seen teachers specify IN COLOR, many boys otherwise use only black and white, and perhaps shades of gray.
Group projects are supposed to teach skills such as working together - how often is the group not a peer group??? Works for an honors class, not when a mixed level group. An honors 11th grade English class project comprised of boys...know they ordered Sunday afternoon pizza (I think they ALL had go get someone and the pizza...) and I cleaned up abandonded paper and cardboard later, heard interesting laughter - wish I could have seen the presentation; one of the few, or the only, group projects I think son enjoyed working on.</p>
<p>Laughing at mkm56's post #64, because teachers in our district do use self-portraits as an evaluative tool. My son's drawings always shocked his teachers because he was obviously very intelligent and mature, but he would, on occasion, draw stick figures of people with 3 legs. Powerpoint was the best thing that ever happened to him, because thereafter he said goodbye to posters and always did his presentations that way.</p>
<p>AP classes also saved him, since most of his classmates were smart and motivated and thus I heard few complaints about group projects once he got to high school, except one where he was supposed to write a poem, put it to music, and sing to the class. He refused.</p>
<p>One rationale for group projects I've heard is the goal of "teaching" creativity. Hmm. Just as there are different learning styles, there are different ways of being creative. S is creative with abstract ideas, but not with visual expression. There is tolerance for kids who don't test well, but I've found there is little tolerance for kids who don't draw well.</p>
<p>with regards to the in color thing, wonder how many boys are colorblind? I am asking a serious question here....</p>
<p>and "three legs"- well...if I was Freud... ;)</p>
<p>We once had to do a group project - build a trebochet (like a catapult) over a weekend...what a nightmare...it was graded on the distance a tennis ball could be sent....I ended up with bent spoons, no duct tape in my house, no tape at all actually, three really cranky girls, a frustrated husband, and a lost weekend...and I say WE cause after day one, of ball not going far enough to get a B, we all jumped in doing research, taking contraption apart, starting over</p>
<p>the lesson, buy a set of plans on line instead of using imagination (girls were honest), and watch kids who copied online plans get As, while those that built from scratch using own brains get Bs</p>
<p>re colorblind-more males than females, not in my son's case, not that many to account for the lack of choosing color. Remember there are different colors confused in colorblindness, don't have the numbers, still have a chart left from med school days. Another color note; no proof on this-I think females can tell color subtleties-shade, tint, whatever, more than males. Another reason husbands get exasperated when asked to make choices...</p>
<p>Interesting -- my husband insists that navy blue and black are the same color. I can show him the two side by side and he says they are the same ...</p>
<p>Diane, my father always swore that those orange tabby cats were pink. You could show him pink and orange and he said they were the same. However, somehow he was an artist (by hobby) and turned out beautiful water colors and oils. He did though lean towards sunsets, come to think of it, maybe the pinks and oranges mixed up didn't matter in those.</p>
<p>Since we are venting, here are some of my "greatest" project memories:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>"Dress in costume to represent a character from your book." What if it's not near Halloween and you can't sew? My oldest son once dressed up in an old swimsuit coverup of mine because it was the closest thing I could figure out to resemble a Greek toga. It looked even worse than you are picturing! :-)</p></li>
<li><p>We were given a long list of supplies to gather one time for a Science experiment. Spent all afternoon going to 4-5 places to get everything on the list, none of which had a certain type of required battery. At the last place, the store clerk said he didn't think such a type of battery existed. When the Science teacher was asked about this, he replied, "Oh, you're right. I think that is a misprint."</p></li>
<li><p>Last year my 8th grade son had a geometry project due the very LAST week of school. It was to design and assemble a scene (such as a town) using at least 6 geometric shapes (cubes, spheres, etc.). The "educational" part of the project was to measure the shapes and record their areas, which my son completed in about 10 minutes. The other 3 hours of the project consisted of me gluing, painting, cutting, etc while my son did more meaningful work for another class. We got an A :-)</p></li>
<li><p>And speaking of last-minute projects, My older son spent the night before his final day of his senior year in high school assembling a wind chime for a physics project, which, by the way, had to be painted and have a "theme." On this very last night before graduating, here was my son and my husband at MIDNIGHT bent over this wind chime, with sweat beads on my son's forehead. What an appropriate way to go out, I thought.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>My D spent two weeks with classmates making a board game, they did a trivia type game, made up quetions, divied up areas, etc..spent lots of time typing, printing, glueling, etc....great work...</p>
<p>Shows up to class, EVERYONE who made game got an A....no matter what it looked like....some boys did it the nightbefore using baseball, and football cards and a pizza box</p>
<p>Wow! The board game project has been mentioned several times on this thread. It must be the only type of project my kids have missed along the way. Hope none of the teachers in my area get wind of this before my youngest graduates. SHHHHHH!</p>
<p>I'm still recovering from the 5th grade California Mission project. We made hundreds of miniature adobe bricks. I think it ended up costing over $100 :-/</p>
<p>Ah, my D has finally found something she hates more than projects--being FORCED to write poetry in iambic pentameter in the style most preferred by her current English teacher. <sigh> The worst is that the teacher grades her down because she just doesn't have the "gift" of a natural poetess. :( We could have told the teacher that! D would prefer arts & crafts to these idiotic WEEKLY poems any day, but of course no one is given choices.</sigh></p>
<p>Here's my sister's plan (she has three little kids) - all kids help with the projects and then they're handed down. The Iroquois Longhouse looked a tad worse for the wear the second time around, third time around it will probably only get a "C." She's the perfect mom! Thrifty and tricky!</p>
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some boys did it the nightbefore using baseball, and football cards and a pizza box
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</p>
<p>My son's board game (fifth grade if I recall) was a paper plate, a knife (the spinner), "decorated" with a pencil, and TWO questions. That was it. Took him about 3 minutes to make. Sad.</p>
<p>we did the mission project using a girlscout box- the kind to carry around all the cookies, covered with hundreds of dyed popcycle sticks</p>
<p>second kid- we were able to talk teacher into letting D do Angel Island, it fit the bill, and was just a hill with a few buildings....weighed a ton...but easy to makle</p>
<p>what irratated me, was that my Ds, it was obvious they were home made and the kids put them together, while some, my goodness, 10 year old architects in the making</p>
<p>last big shared project- a movie about a time in history, think they rapped the killing of Caeser- kind of funny</p>