"Thank you for our group!" some kids told me last week when they saw their field day assignments.
"You're welcome," I replied, "I tried to give everyone what they requested."
"No offense," crowed one of that group to his classmates, "but we have the best team ever!"
"Yeah we do!" added another. "We are going to dominate!"
A few of the other kids looked a little dejected. it was true that the members of the group in question were smart and athletic.
"Well," I said, "there are a lot of different activities that require all sorts of strengths, but the main thing is cooperation. You have some strong personalities on your team, and you're going to need to work hard to keep everyone in balance."
I reminded them of our conversation today when I saw several of the group scowling and heard others of them shouting. They were embroiled in a huge disagreement concerning the scavenger hunt and had thrown the rules about teamwork and staying together aside.
"Remember how happy you were about your group?" I said. "That's because you really like each other. Try to focus on your friendship and get through this."
But it was near the end of a long day, and they just couldn't completely recover. The same was true for other of the self-selected groups; there wasn't enough diversity of personalities and interests to make a well-rounded team. In the end, it was the teams that were a combination of friends and classmates that ended up being the most successful.
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