Disrupting Class

While working on a project for a course I am currently taking in my doctoral program, I needed to comment on the dynamics of a collaborate groups trying to work together within a doctoral program.  There are some pre-cursors to these observations:
1.  This was a large group (over 10) of K-12 educators.
2.  All of these educators had made the conscious decision to spend thousands of dollars on an advanced degree, and therefore have a certain level of drive that is above the average professional.
3.  All are leaders in their respective fields, are highly motivated, and highly intelligent.

So with those perimeters of the group dynamics in mind, anyone want to guess how things went?:)...................

At first, it felt as though we would be stuck in purgatory forever.  All cooks and no dishwashers in the kitchen (I would use another analogy but it could be taken as offensive to Native Americans and I do not want to offend any member of a group of people that has been murdered and oppressed by my ancestors and our government for generations).  But I digress.....As I listened to the conversation, and I admit that I was part of the mess as we tried to sort ideas, the process was disruptive in a more primitive sense.  But as people though out loud, some realized the need to reserve comments, and one wonderful lady agreed to start washing dishes, things slowly....and painfully slowly for a Type A, list-oriented, goals driven person to handle....slowly, the project started to take shape.  Dealing with frusteration, making sure I knew my role, and the late hour of night, I could not reflect on the experience that day.  But now having time to step back, seeing a group come together that is so used to being dominant and leading was an accomplishment in iteself.  While the end-product remains to be seen, the amount fo disruption the process has created in the proposed lesson that was generated is something to be proud of, even if the lesson does not work out to everybody's expectations come this Saturday.  The group used the larger notion of Disruption to create a disruptive lesson that will hopefully add to the success of the fist exercise (coming together as a group to achieve a common goal).

Stay tuned.....