A little bit about me: I am totally type A, control freak, don't like depending on others when my grade is on the line. This poses quite the problem when you're in a semester full of group work/co-teaching clinicals.

I was getting coffee the other day with one of my dear friends who also is finishing up her teaching degree. We were catching up on the craziness of our semester and I was complaining  about the partners I've kept getting stuck with for these group lesson plans [One partner didn't turn in our lesson plan when I texted/reminded her like 25 times... seriously, her one job?!] My dear friend agreed on the agony of it all but then, gave me some good hard truth [one thing I love about her and our friendship].

She was in the middle of a week long teaching process at a school where they focus on team teaching. Her cooperating teacher [CT] and the CT's co-teacher are two very different personalities. The CT is laid back and more care free, while the co-teacher is bit more stern and things need to be her way only. They had the classes in the library picking out one autobiography each. The CT had told her students they could also pick out one other book for pleasure, the co-teacher, had strictly said no. As students were getting two different responses, the co-teacher came storming up to the CT and said, "I specifically said we are only checking out the one book, and thats what we're going to do." My friend said that the CT just said ok and that was that. But more so the lesson was in between the lines.

As educators, we will be working with other teachers, whether that be co-teaching or team teaching a specific grade. It will be like one large group project, whether we like it or not. We can either be miserable and angry when others aren't doing things the way we'd like, or we can suck it up and make the most out of working with different types of people.

My sweet friend gave me a dose of reality. I may hate group projects now in college, but it is just the beginning. I need to be more focused on the product we're producing then the way it's getting done. I need to be more like Jesus and have compassion on people who maybe don't view grades the same way I do, or work in the same manner as I. I need to be a bit more kind and a bit more flexible.