How do you deal with group work with non-mature students?

[18yearstooold]

We've been put into groups for a group presentation -5 weeks ago

The rest of my group are 19 and live on campus

I'm not 19, am a lone parent and live 20 miles away

We haven't started yet because they keep missing arranged meetings and saying, doesn't matter, we can do it after lectures -well no I can't actually

I've arranged childcare for 4 days this holiday so I can go in -they keep cancelling at short notice because they've had a better offer -either social or shifts at work

We need to pass this and they don't seem to care

Feel like knocking their heads together -they don't seem to understand I can't pull an all nighter the day before to get it done

What do I do?

Not all non-mature students are the same. I am 22 in my final year and a lot of students are really good at meetings and presentations, sometimes you just draw the worst ones.

I understand how hard it can be with a child and making meetings when you have childcare, I have a child myself buts it's just one of those things unfortunately.

I would email your tutor telling them you are having some trouble with the group so at least it is document. If the tutor can see you have been there each week for the classes, then at least they can recognise you have done the work.

Is there anyway you can do your section and email it to someone in the group to put on the presentation. Is it essential to meet or can you do most via email?

Wiki = What I Know Is. It's like a thread on here, basically, except it's in Moodle so your lecturers can see it. You can upload documents and edit them and use it to arrange meetings etc.

If you have a fish around on your Moodle site you should be able to find how to do it - try the internal 'help' bit. If not, email IT and they'll be so excited that someone's using Moodle that they'll fall over themselves to help you.

Good luck!

I feel your pain, hang on in there.

Just wanted to post a reminder, that you can't really rely on the assumption that this issue falls away in the work environment.

There will always be people who do not pull their weight, even if it tends to be for different reasons: prioritising someone else's work, building careers and their own network at the expense of your projects. If they are really good at it, you can be left wondering when nemesis will get them. It may take a long time, certainly well beyond your deadline

It,s great practice to work out how to succeed in spite of them.

I have got through group work by accepting I will have to do most of the work if I want a good mark and just getting on with it. I did have at least a couple of people who wanted to work in each group though.

If you're the only one that's tough.

A friend of mine was in this position and she spoke to the uni about it. Despite trying really hard with the others, they never did any work. I d9n't know the detail, but i do know the uni made an exception and recognised it was more her work than theirs.

Group work is evil!

For my final year choices I have deliberately chosen modules which are not assessed through group work.

I had this issue. I commuted to uni which as a 2 hour train journey. People wouldn't meet when I was able to or would suggest evening meetings on days I wasn't there they were there all the time and free! So infuriating. In the end we separated out work into you do this, I do that and did it all ourselves then put it together at the end. It worked ok but not ideal.

Sorry but that's nonsense about the issue not falling away in the work place.

Yes you will meet slackers at work, but it's nothing like as bad as group work IMO! In most jobs they would get sacked. In others you at least have the choice to leave if it's really that bad, and most work projects aren't as pressured as something you have to produce in a short period of time, which will give you academic grades which last a lifetime and could profoundly affect any future success / opportunities ....

Finallyhere I totally disagree with you. In the workplace if someone doesn't contribute to a team they are removed (i.e. fired or people just don't ask them to work in teams anymore).

Those who mocked me and did not participate in teamwork were not punished. They were allowed to freeride. Quite frankly they should have been given a fail for the coursework portion and removed from the group. Why should my work/learning suffer because of them?

Hmmm dont think we can access wiki we can't edit anything, it's read only and turnitin

I would chat with the other mature students and, if you feel you would work better together, I'd ask to be allowed to do that in the future.

I will never forget the day our group was asked to plan a weekly timetable showing when we would fit our study in. While the other mature students and I were trying to fit in sufficient time around our jobs, school runs, etc, the students behind us were making an enormous fuss about making sure they kept a day free during the week for shopping and planning nothing for Sundays so they could go out and get wrecked every Saturday night. I'm sure they benefitted greatly from working with older students who kept them on task but the mature students got nothing but extra stress from working with them.

I dread this. I'm a mature student on two hour commute and about 50-% of my classes don't show most days. There's people I've not seen this semester. In a few weeks I've an assessment in pairs and I'm really worried about getting a weak partner as they are assigned on the day.

I have just finished supervising a group of 9 students on a project which included a presentation. They coordinated everything through a Facebook group and made a lot of use of Dropbox for sharing work. One of them set up a Powerpoint template for the presentation which they all used to give a uniform look and feel. They did meet a lot, this was an hour long presentation, so the week before they probably spent a day or two together, including at least two full run-throughs.
I definitely think it is worth contacting the lecturer (even though it is the holidays they are probably around) to express your concerns.
I have to say that we have an expectation that students are available 9-5 every day (most of our students are in classes for a large proportion of that anyway) so you would have all my sympathy if your group is refusing 9am meetings! In your lecturer's position I might be tempted to split up the mature students to try and get some work ethic into the others! (Which is very unfair, I admit).

I know in my uni when we do group work. We allocate each member a mark. So you can mark people down for not pulling their weight.

We also have to say which part we did and contributed to and how.

If this is not in place with your uni it is a good idea-perhaps suggest it.

Just say nicely in a group chat that child care is non negotiable. So can we all make sure that by...whatever date this is done. And split the work and deligate out relivant parts. Even if you do not meet up before hand everyone can still upload their parts to the group message so can continue to work collectively.

Good luck!

I sypathise as I am a mature student too (40ish). Have been in many groups with various lazy or difficult people. Not just by age. Some 18 year olds were fabulous and some older not so. We have to attend at least 85% as we are an NHS course with attandence requirements. I am not keen on pbl or groups but just have to muddle through.

Im in the same situation! Not a mature student however I have a baby and understand how annoying it is when they say 'we can just stay behind'

I would arrange a meeting or say via a group message if your struggling to get together and put an agreed timetable in place which says what work will be done by the end of each week from now til the deadline. That way you can clearly demonstrate to them when your falling behind. This might be a bit of motivation for them.

I say this as when i have actually met with my group they seem to spend a lot of time just chatting, I dont think they realise I'm putting my child in childcare to be there!

Good luck with your work

I know nobody on my course (haven't had the chance I'm also a single mum), and for one module we had to get in to groups. 99% of the people in the lecture hall had all made groups and I was left with 4 very unsocial nervous kids. They gave me the side eye when I tried to initiate normal everyday conversation, like I was some weirdo.

Turns out they've excluded me from the group on purpose of course and the lecturer for that module has let me do my own presentation in his office.

Ah I've found my people. I'm also a mature student but so is the rest of my group but it turns out that isn't helping.
They haven't read either assignment description, haven't done the pre reading, wastes FOUR hours writing a group contract (required but not rocket science) and it isn't even finished.
Then to cap it all off suggested we split the module reading required for the several individual assignments between us and share notes as they can't be bothered to do the reading.
By the fifth time of explaining that 1) this ambling discussion has nothing to do with the group work, 2) we need to make some progress we present in two weeks and haven't started and 3) sharing notes and not reading 6/7 of the required reading would be both stupid and cheating I had to leave before I used my laptop as a weapon.
Two more days of lectures with them, might just take my iPad tomorrow in case I flip out. It won't hurt them as much.