How to Help Kids Get Better at Teamwork: Practical Tips From an Elementary Teacher
The glue stick fumes were thick enough to cut by 2 o’clock last month in my 4th grade classroom, and the volcano project group in the back corner was finally coming apart. Mia, our fastest worker who turns in every assignment two days early, slammed her black marker down on the table hard enough to make a crumpled paper cup bounce. “If you two aren’t going to do anything, I’ll just finish the whole thing myself tonight,” she said. Javi, who spends most of science class doodling spaceships in the margin of his notebook, shrugged and went back to drawing. “I never wanted to do a stupid volcano anyway,” he mumbled. Lila twisted her hair and stared at her shoes, the 12 half-drawn sketch of a mountain peeking out from under her eraser.
I’ve been teaching 4th grade for 12 years. Early on, I’d have jumped in right there: split the project into three equal sections, write each kid’s name on their task, remind everyone to be kind and pull their weight. I did that dozens of times, and it always got the project done on time. But it never really taught anyone how to work in a team. So this time, I finished marking the spelling test on my desk first, then walked over, leaned against the edge of the table, and asked one question: “What’s one thing each of you actually want out of this project?”
Mia talked first, fast. She just didn’t want to get a bad grade because her teammates didn’t care. She’d stayed up three nights the last group project finishing everyone’s work, and she didn’t want to do it again. Javi admitted he’d wanted to do a project about remote-controlled sensor lights, but the group voted for volcanoes, so he’d tuned out. If he could add a remote trigger to make the baking soda explode on cue, he’d contribute. Lila spoke up quiet: she’d been painting landscapes after school for a year, and she wanted to paint the mountain. Mia kept saying she’d do it faster, so Lila hadn’t gotten to do anything.
No one immediately said “oh that makes sense, let’s all be friends.” Mia crossed her arms for a minute, then sighed. “Fine. If you build the trigger and paint the mountain, I’ll get the baking soda and write the report. But you two have to have your parts done by Thursday.” It wasn’t perfectly equal. Javi’s trigger took half an hour, Mia wrote the whole report, Lila spent two art classes painting. But everyone showed up with their part. No one bailed, and no one stayed up until 10 o’clock the night before finishing everyone else’s work.
This isn’t just a classroom thing, of course. Last summer, my 12-year-old son and a handful of neighborhood kids planned a vegetable garden in the empty lot at the end of our street. He came home fuming after the first day, saying the two 14-year-olds were doing all the planning and wouldn’t let anyone help, and the two 7-year-olds were pulling up seedlings just for fun. I almost grabbed my shoes and headed down there to sort everyone out. Then I remembered the volcano group, and told him to go back and ask everyone what part they actually wanted to do. He came back an hour later confused. The 7-year-olds just wanted to water the plants and hunt for earthworms to put in the soil, which none of the older kids wanted to do anyway. The 14-year-olds hated digging and carrying compost, so they were happy to pass that off to my son, who just wanted to be outside moving around instead of drawing maps. It worked. No one did the same amount of work, but everyone got something they wanted out of it.
I’ve picked up three small things over the years that work way better than telling kids to “be a good team player.” First, don’t assign roles before anyone talks. It’s easy to split up tasks to save time, but that means you’re fitting kids to roles instead of finding what each kid actually wants to bring. If your kids are doing a sibling bake sale, instead of saying “you mix, you clean up,” ask them first what part they’re excited about. You might find out the younger one wants to measure all the ingredients, not just pour sprinkles, and the older one doesn’t mind cleaning up if they don’t have to measure. Second, let small conflicts sit before you step in. If kids are arguing, give them five minutes to work it out on their own before you interfere. I used to think stepping in immediately prevented bad feelings, but it just means kids never get to practice coming up with their own compromises. Third, name the specific good things you see, instead of just pointing out what’s wrong. Instead of saying “you need to listen to your teammate more,” say “I liked how you paused to let Lila finish her idea just now. That helped everyone understand what she wanted.” Specific feedback sticks way better than vague reminders.
The volcano group got second place at the school science fair. Mia was a little disappointed she didn’t get first, which she’s used to getting. But after the fair, she told me it was nice not having to do everything herself. I still have group projects fall apart. I still have kids who refuse to participate, or who take over the whole thing, and some projects turn out half-done at the end. This isn’t a trick that fixes all teamwork problems overnight. But over the years, I’ve noticed that kids don’t actually need to do perfectly equal work to learn how to be on a team. They just need to figure out that their part matters, if they get to pick what it is. Right now, this month’s group projects are underway, and I’m already hearing arguments from the water cycle group by the window. I’m just going to wait a few more minutes before I walk over.
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