Investigative study about project work groups in schools.

• Main Author: Ku, Evelyn Yin Ling.
• Other Authors: Lee, Chu Keong
• Format: Theses and Dissertations
• Language: English
• Published: 2009
• Subjects: DRNTU::Library and information science::Knowledge management
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/14576
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

With the emergence of a flat, flexible organization and “knowledge economy”, drastic changes are sweeping across the workplace. Such changes have resulted in greater emphasis being placed on workers’ ability to work collaboratively with others. To prepare workers for the future workplace environment, educational institutions have since reviewed and adjusted the school curriculum to place more emphasis on providing students with the opportunities and skills to work in groups. In Singapore, the school curriculum has witnessed the compulsory implementation of Project Work syllabus to this end. This study investigated students and their involvement in project work groups. The students were approached as primary sources of knowledge for their experience in project work groups. Using grounded theory methodology, twenty-seven participants ranging from 13 to 14 years of age, from a secondary school, were interviewed in order to use an inductive, data-driven approach to elucidate on the concept of student project work group namely: how project work groups form; what impact does its formation have on the group’s experience; and how group experience affect future group formation tendencies. The results conclusively demonstrate that project work group formation is a multi-faceted and complex process. The research revealed that project work group formation process was facilitated by three mechanisms: homophily, competency, and environment that served to reduce participants’ perceived sense threat and uncertainty arising from conditions that exist at the institutional and sub-institutional levels. Although all the groups were formed based on a combination of these three mechanisms, they experienced differential rates of success and satisfaction. A comparison between two groups led the researcher to conclude that the subtle differences in the combination of mechanisms were responsible for the differences in group experience. Finally, participants’ future group formation tendencies were still very much skewed towards familiarity. However, there were indications that participants were looking for novel qualities such as humour to meet more sophisticated needs.