“Tell me and I will forget, show me and I may remember; involve me and I will understand.” (Confucius)
This week’s theme was very interesting, but also challenging. Challenging on the one hand because our PBL group merged with another group and we first had to get to know each other and find common ground, which happened not without friction. Challenging also because I learned a lot about myself and had to face some of my weaknesses.
That made it interesting at the same time, because I learned more about my strengths on the other side.
I noticed that I function very well in harmonious groups that give support and appreciation and reflect with respect. I like to be prepared and proceed quickly and efficiently, with structure. I don’t mind the discussion and I think it’s absolutely important that everyone can speak their mind. But I have noticed that it is hard work to keep a very heterogeneous group together and make it work. Friction and discussions about details are tiring for me.
I have rarely had this experience in my other trainings, where the focus is on learning and developing the individual. But I know this difficulty from my workplace, where you have to work in a group towards a common goal and integrate different (sometimes conflicting) points of view. Even if the product ist elaborate and satisfying in the end, they way towards it is a challenge.
Nevertheless, I have confirmed that I am a fan of collaboration and networked learning. I learn so much better and faster with and from others than when I read an article or a book or watch a video.
That’s why I want to add another dimension to Confucius’ quote:
“Tell me and I will forget, show me and I may remember; involve me and I will understand.”
I would like to add:
“Let me share it with others, and I will learn.”
Lars Harrysson
November 23, 2022 — 6:21 pm
Fantastic addition to Confucius’ quote.
Your post adds a lot of interesting shifts in position as you describe your experiences from the work during topic 3. You brilliantly illuminates conflicts, you nicely term them frictions, as a vehicle to learn about yourself, to what you bring into the group, what you meet and how you feel about it. Often, I think, we reason about goal efficiency as a target, as if the goals will bring us anywhere, when we most often need to reason group awareness to be effective and achieve desirable results. It takes time to develop a common language (meaning that we understand each other and what we talk about), even though it is easier to do so in a group with some common ambitions, such as following a course curriculum. Still, as an example, I am not sure there is a shared understanding in the group to what output is. Ludwig Wittgenstein would have called what is going on a language game, and the meaning of the word output requires shared understanding of the rules of the game. I think your text in a nice way illustrates such a process. My interpretation of course, and please, contest it. I have no idea of what the rules of our game is, do you :-)?
Karin Graf
November 28, 2022 — 9:13 am
Thank you for sharing your thoughts, Lars. My sentiments exactly! We as a group are not there yet, but as they say, the journey is the destination, and as long as we learn along the way, it stays interesting and worthwile…. 🙂
Miriam
December 6, 2022 — 4:18 pm
I love it when people from Scandinavia say something is fantastic. That’s exactly your addition to this famous sentence (actually there are three sentences) by Lao Tzu: It’s indeed a brilliant idea, and it also corresponds exactly to my perception. When you share something, you have to talk or write about it, which initiates a process of reflection. This means that sharing also means reflecting. You think about how you present something so that others understand it. You could already say that this is a form of the concept of learning through teaching (LdL in German).
Florentina Gartmann
December 7, 2022 — 10:27 am
Thank you for your interesting, honest and also inspiring blog at the same time.
“Tell me and I will forget, show me and I may remember; involve me and I will understand. Let me share it with others, and I will learn.”
This is such a great addition from you. I will take it to my heart and use it in everyday life.
I felt the same way as you about the PBL group work. Our group was also merged with another group and it took us a moment to function as one big group again. I think working in a large group makes collaborative learning more challenging, as you write the group often get lost in details, misunderstandings or disagreements arise faster, and it just takes more time for agreements / decisions to be made in my opinion.
However, I also very much like collaborative learning, it’s a real pleasure how much information can be compiled / exchanged together in a very short time.