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Comment by jshen | Hacker News Reader

"In one fourth-grade classroom I visited in New York City, students engaged in group work were forbidden to ask a question unless every member of the group had the very same question."

I'm going to guess that the idea here is that if someone in the group has a question, and another member of the group knows the answer, then they can resolve it within the group. Funny how the same thing can be framed so differently isn't it?

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I used to be a teacher and received training to instruct exactly as you describe. The idea is that students are supposed to ask each other first, and if no one else in the group knows, then they ask the teacher. I have very mixed feelings about the push towards group work, but I will say that in much of the inner-city, asking a peer for help on anything is considered pitiable weakness. So the idea of getting kids to learn to work together and help each other when they can, is, at least in it's conception, not altogether terrible.

So if anyone in your group insists he knows the answer, you're out of luck. Reframe: The blind leading the blind.

So if anyone in your group doesn't care about your question, you're out of luck. Reframe: I don't know why I even bother.

So if anyone in your group is more interested in a different question, you're both out of luck. Reframe: Sorry, class, we're out of time.

Yes, it's funny how many ways a bad idea can be framed differently.

I believe that is an extreme and cartoonish conclusion to draw from so little information. How do you know that is the experience the children have?

The sister comment from another teacher brings facts to the table that explain the intent of the exercise, which is limited in scope and aimed for a specific purpose. Good or bad it is a game to attempt to teach kids it is ok to admit they don't know and to ask for help from their peers. If you consider how often and how ennervating it is when our adult colleagues can't admit not knowing, I think you can understand why someone crafted this exercise.

I have enough information to tell that children in this case are forbidden to ask their question unless everyone in the group has the same question, because that information was explicitly given. This is not the same rule as one which allows an individual child to freely ask the teacher whatever he likes, whether his groupmates want to ask or not, if he still feels like asking after trying his peers first.

The former process is controlled by the group; the latter, by the individual.

I agree that it sounds like a bad idea, but you're just having a knee-jerk reaction. You don't have enough information to make that judgement. How do you know this wasn't a well crafted exercise designed to teach certain elements of social interaction? I guarantee you a good teacher could use a situation like this as a tool to teach the class something valuable.

Hell, it could be an exercise to teach students the dangers of group think. It would be intellectually dishonest of the author to frame the situation in the way that she did, but we have no idea of the context. Did the author watch the whole class and speak with the teach afterward, or did she just observe the class for a few minutes?

Without more context you just don't have enough information to make such a damning judgement.

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