This text first appeared in The Educating Professor on November 25, 2019 © Magna Publications. All rights reserved. Attempt a FREE three-week trial of The Educating Professor!
When college students be taught there might be group work in a course, they typically let up a collective groan. Group work tends to go away a nasty style in college students’ mouths on account of their lack of know-how of group dynamics. When you plan to make use of group actions in your programs, making use of a free character evaluation prematurely may help college students higher perceive who they and their classmates are and the way to work effectively inside a gaggle.
The Jung Typology Check
Based mostly on the work of psychoanalyst Carl Jung, this typology take a look at measures an individual’s character alongside 4 dimensions. The typology produces outcomes which can be one in all 16, four-letter codes that Myers and Briggs developed for the Myers–Briggs Sort Indicator. I at all times begin with the Jung Typology Check as a result of college students normally are conversant in the concept of extroverts and introverts, if not all the mannequin. The report that this website provides college students tells them what their code is and explains it. For an in-person class I cowl every pairing (E/I, S/N, T/F, P/J), and we do a spherical of debate for every one. For every spherical I’ve the scholars divide into two teams (E/I to start out) based mostly on their outcomes and provides every group a sheet of sticky-note flipchart for them to file their concepts about what it means to be their character sort and what others can anticipate from them when working collectively on initiatives. Subsequent, they cling their concepts on the wall, and we focus on what every character sort’s traits imply for the way we work together with one another and as a category, with every sort’s group presenting its concepts. Lastly, I’ve college students use the outcomes to line up on a spectrum of most extroverted to most introverted, after which we speak about what the distribution of every dichotomy (e.g., extroverts vs introverts) means for us as a category and in teams. The dialogue of all 4 pairings sometimes takes an hour—extra if college students have quite a bit to say.
On-line college students can focus on the pairings as effectively. I exploit the teams characteristic in my studying administration system, and I let college students self-enroll relying on their outcomes and generate the identical concepts throughout the first half of the week. Every group nominates somebody to submit the group’s concepts concerning the Jung outcomes to the principle class dialogue board. We duplicate the “line up on the spectrum” exercise by utilizing a Google Sheet the place college students can enter their names to point their outcomes on the spectrum. (I’m positive there are extra refined methods of doing this.) Utilizing the dialogue board to replicate on, examine, and distinction their outcomes helps college students not solely perceive themselves higher but additionally get to know their classmates. To shut dialogue in each class codecs, I ask college students to replicate in our LMS journal software about what they discovered about themselves and their classmates and the way this information may help them work higher in teams—whether or not in our class, in different lessons, at work, or at residence.
The DISC
The DISC evaluation, based mostly on the analysis of psychologist William Moulton Marston, is one which few college students have encountered earlier than. It measures tendencies and categorizes college students into one in all 4 varieties: dominant, influential, regular, or conscientious. Throughout class college students divide into the 4 teams related to their outcomes and, as with the Jung outcomes, focus on what their outcomes imply for them and for working with others. We take into account what it might imply if, for a gaggle mission, all of the Ds have been collectively, all of the Is, and so forth. Once more college students understand why a mixture of character varieties can result in group success—or to battle if group members don’t perceive the character varieties that encompass them. In my on-line lessons we once more use the teams and self-enroll options for everybody to share their concepts initially of the week earlier than somebody in every group volunteers to summarize the group’s ideas on the principle dialogue board for the category later within the week. As with the Jung, I ask college students to write down a mirrored image paper to course of their new insights into themselves and their classmates.
Compass Factors Exercise
The Compass Factors Exercise may help college students to develop empathy and emotional intelligence in addition to see, through their outcomes, their preferences about working with and in teams. One good characteristic of this exercise is that you are able to do it in school as a brief, 20-minute dialogue or lengthen it utilizing instructions offered. Just like the debrief on the Jung Typology Check and the DISC, it provides college students in a classroom setting an opportunity to stand up and transfer a bit to decide on a gaggle that aligns with their main instincts when given a activity to finish; in an evening or prolonged interval class, then, it may be a great way to reenergize the room with extra than simply dialog. In a web based surroundings we once more use the teams for a self-enroll dialogue of their most popular route throughout the first half of the week, after which one individual volunteers to convey the group’s concepts again to the principle dialogue board for a whole-class dialogue throughout the second half of the week. We additionally finish this exercise with a written reflection.
I exploit these three assessments as a result of all of them inform college students barely various things about their personalities and have sufficient frequent floor that college students can see their outcomes have some consistency. It’s true that taking the Jung and DISC exams in a heightened emotional state, both constructive or destructive, can skew the outcomes, so I warn college students about this when assigning them. I ask college students to not take them when they’re drained, pissed off, or hungry (or hangry) or once they’ve simply had a very constructive expertise. I would like them to easily be their levelheaded, atypical selves. I’m additionally impressed that these actions have excessive completion and participation charges, for which I in all probability ought to thank BuzzFeed quizzes and academic gamification methods.
Moreover, doing these actions creates the additional advantage of my attending to know my college students and their attending to know me and their classmates, and on a deeper stage than we are able to in lessons that don’t have such conversations. I ask them to share private examples to reveal their outcomes, and I do the identical. They’ve enjoyable guessing my outcomes after they’ve mentioned theirs. Due to this, the lessons by which I exploit these are inclined to have a greater general studying surroundings than those by which I don’t use them.
You probably have group initiatives in your programs, you should utilize the take a look at outcomes to kind college students in order that they have a mix of individuals of their teams. It’s okay if they’re all extroverts or introverts, however having all Sensers or lntuiters, for instance, or all Dominant or Regular group members can result in pressure and lack of progress. To assist college students see this, you possibly can have small group actions or discussions in school the place you assemble group in that method for them to expertise that discord, acknowledge that their character tendencies are the causes of that discord, and start to grasp the way to work despite that discord.
Having college students replicate on the Jung Typology Check, the DISC evaluation, and the Compass Factors Exercise as a gaggle can profit their group initiatives. My college students’ first “group” project is to share their outcomes with one another and use these to differentiate the “massive image” individuals from the detail-oriented members, the “thinkers” from the “deciders,” to allow them to assign roles. We already coated these particulars as we broke down every evaluation, so it’s good recall and utility follow for college students too.
College students report that studying extra about themselves helps them work higher with others, simply as studying about how others differ from them helps them recognize how various personalities may help every group member and the group as a complete construct on their strengths and enhance their weaknesses. I’ve discovered that each undergraduate and graduate pupil teams appear to settle sooner and work higher collectively after I’ve used these assessments than after I haven’t. Attempt them in your lessons as effectively!
Wren Mills, PhD, is a pedagogical assistant professor within the division of Academic Administration, Management, and Analysis at Western Kentucky College.
