Letting the Drama into Groupwork: using conflict constructively in collaborative performance projects
 Tracy Crossley, University of Salford, t.l.crossley@salford.ac.uk

The paper considers some pertinent questions around the issue of group conflict in performing arts practical work, and difficulties posed in relation to teaching, learning and assessment methodologies.

In many discussions of group-based learning in educational theory and practice,
conflict is addressed largely in terms of its detrimental effects upon group work and strategies for conflict avoidance. This paper examines how conflict might be re-considered as having a productive impact upon the creative process, and ways in which students might be given guidance in conflict management in order to turn disagreement and difference into constructive and creative outcomes.

The paper also examines student understanding of assessment criteria related to collaboration and suggests that, similarly, students often interpret these as implying a need to avoid conflict rather than engage constructively with it. I argue that this perception leads many students to resort to “safe” and/or unimaginative approaches to the work through concurrence seeking and “groupthink”, rather than risk expressing difference and disagreement, because they fear being penalised in assessment.

The paper proposes that creating a safe environment for students, in which conflict and controversy can be explored in relation to task objectives, can enhance the learning process since this provides an opportunity for the group to reflect upon their working processes and re-negotiate expectations within the group.  Controversy also allows for entry of new ideas that might get suppressed in the interests of “groupthink”.   If conflict could be re-considered as having a potentially constructive impact upon the creative process it may no longer be seen as a wholly detrimental peril that should be avoided at all costs.
 

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