I have no trouble moving between lecture and discussion formats in the
kinds of classes I describe. I think that's because I never conduct a
discussion without a clear structure and motive. The motive has two
sides: the term-long project I've assigned and the student's own choice
of a project topic that fits with his or her own identity. (In my view
neither side suffices.) The structure is very simple and flows from
the motive: each day that we talk about students' projects, I want each
student to feel clear that he or she knows what his or her next step is.
So I ask, are you clear what your next step is? Can you tell us what it
is and why? We keep discussing until we have answers. I offer advice
and ways of looking at things and rough generalizations and precedents,
but I insist (correctly, I think) that I have no way of knowing what the
student's next step ought to be, both because I don't know the particulars
of the materials the student is studying and because the project will only
work if it flows out of the student's own interests and identity. The
way to discover these is to start somewhere, engage with some materials,
and then find out what the student is responding to. "Responses" can
include anger, puzzlement, being reminded of something, empathy, career
opportunity, or just an unarticulated sense of finding something interesting.
So long as we keep our focus on this interplay between the student's
interest and the formal ("professional") structure of the project, keeping
discussion going is not a problem. Sometimes everybody in the whole class
claims to know exactly what their next step is. Then I ask for stories on
particular topics and start from those. Every class begins by asking if
anybody is having trouble, or has had a bad experience, or is feeling
confused, and we get that stuff out in the open.
About group work. Motive is the key here as well. I have no objections
if others want to organize classes as group work; I actually do it myself
sometimes for small things. My personal experience is that I cannot
organize groups in a way that provides a clear, meaningful motive for
fair participation by everyone. I have to say that Tim's invocation of
workplace "teams" bothers me a bit, and particularly the whole language
of "accountability", which I regard as capitalist work-discipline pure
and simple. I think teachers should go ahead and bring their values into
the way they organize their classes, provided those values are made clear,
and if the internalization of capitalist work-discipline is the reigning
value in a given classroom then so be it, at least for an elective class.
I do find value in some of the business literature on work; my ethnography
class in particular is much influenced by Peter Block, whose work I find
fascinating despite its starkly individualistic character. (See particularly
his first book, which is addressed to business consultants; for "consultant"
read "ethnographer" throughout and it's very valuable advice.) On the topic
of teams, accountability, and work-discipline, see
James R. Barker, Tightening the iron cage: Concertive control in self-managing
teams, Administrative Science Quarterly 38(4), 1993, pages 408-437.
and my paper on "empowerment" in Computer Supported Cooperative Work last year.
Phil Agre