9.(20161119) Imagine that if a professor wants students to learn as much as possible about a project in a short period of time, is it better for students to work in a group or to study alone?

头脑风暴

在很多生活类的话题中也出现过类似的题目。这种类型的题目主要是让考生选择，应该独立完成任务还是小组合作学习/寻求他人的帮助。独立学习的好处主要是没有干扰，并 且可以锻炼个人的能力；合作的主要优势是大家可以各取所长，发挥自己的特长，让工作更有效率地完成。

范文思路

观点： 独自学习更好。

理由一： no discussion, no distraction。

理由二： feel more urged to do more work。

范文文本

Nowadays, more and more education professionals begin to reveal a rising trend that students tend to prefer individual tasks.On the other side, there are several investigations demonstrating that students would reveal higher autonomy and individual accomplishment when they are doing assignments by themselves.This draws my attention to the pros and cons of different school assignment patterns.In my own point of view, I prefer to sustain that letting students to study all by themselves would be a more efficient choice.

Admittedly, when students are collaborating in groups, more ideas can come up and everybody is able to learn something out of others’ comments.But this idea failed to explore the complexity of the issue.It’s true that sometimes other group members can come up with great ideas and contribute to others’ thinking.But most of the time, other participants can be noisy and annoying with their irrelevant ideas, which would hamper everyone else from thinking more insightfully and deeply, and would thus reduce general efficiency.

观点

让步段，承认了小组讨论中能产生更多的点子和灵感，但同时，这些观点往往浮于表面，不会对问题进行特别深入的探究。

The most conspicuous aspect of the claim that individual assignments would be more favorable when efficiency is required is that all the distractions from other group members could be eliminated so that students can focus on their own affairs.I had this previous experience that excessive group discussions ruined the project.When our psychology teacher assigned us to research more about social psychology, he divided the class into three groups and required every group to look more deeply within a distinctive sphere within social psychology.In our group sessions, I originally thought it would be constructive in useful discussions and everyone would contribute.But when all the group members came to the café and our discussion started, two boys began to argue on the selection of the topic for 30 minutes.They all had very strong opinions and no one was willing to step back.After an hour we finally confirmed the topic and began researching.But after a short while, two girls started talking with high pitch and sharp voices next to me that I cannot think clearly.Some group members were continuously asking permission to leave because they wanted to buy coffee or go to bathroom or just take a nap.After a whole day, our only progress was “a thorough list of the leading scientists within this area”, which is merely a minor part of the overall plan.This example might be a little bit extreme, but it clearly reflects a possible outcome of group projects.Under such circumstances, individual work is inarguably a more efficient option.

观点展开

承认文中举的例子可能存在一定的特殊性，但同时也恰恰反映了小组合作可能出现的后果，点出观点。

论据

有关于心理学的理论和例子值得同学们的积累和借鉴，在教育/生活类话题中都比较常见。

Another advisable reason for claiming that high efficiency is possible only when studying alone is that this would make sure every student has fully participated and learned something.People might just sit and wait for others’ outcome in group work, and letting students study all by themselves can largely prevent this.There is an idea in psychology called social loafing, which means that when individuals are working in groups, their average effort is lower than what they might put when working alone.A famous experiment of this topic involves peeling potatoes.A group of young people were first assigned to peel potatoes by themselves in an hour, and then they were put into groups of 6 to do the same thing in the same period of time.When researchers collected data of these two arrangements, the result was very surprising.The average individual outcome of every member in the group is 36 potatoes, which is far lower than the 48 potatoes when people are peeling by themselves.This scientific concept explains to us that, in order to maximize everyone’s gain from the assignment, letting them study alone would be a better choice.

In view of what I have illustrated above, it is reasonable to insist on the point that arranging students to work by themselves would be a more suitable plan in this situation.For individuals, they would not be interrupted by irrelevant group talks; for the class in general, everyone can learn a little bit more compared to what they could in group working.

语料积累

单词

constructive 建设性的

词组

be inarguably a more efficient option 无可争议地成为一个更有效的选择

peel potatoes 削土豆

social loafing 社会惰性

insist on 坚持

be interrupted by 被打断

句型

The most conspicuous aspect of the claim that...这个观点最显著的方面……

In view of what I have illustrated above...鉴于上述观点…… LeMZ5jzHE4CCvv+Mac6EySRougIolrQ+Pq008IBUUU5xLvkXAls0m+YH1K7gtGlT