Adjourning Phase Michelle Holmberg

Prior to this assignment I never really gave much thought about how I had adjourned groups that I had been members of. As I thought about the various groups that I had participated in over the years I thought of my college groups, my work groups, parent groups, and many others.  One thing that I immediately noticed was that how each of them adjourned had been in a different manner based on the what I believe to be the relationship amongst the team members.

As I think back to being in college and all of the times that I met with my peers to complete group assignment or tasks I recall always encouraging one another that it was getting closer with each class and that we together would make it through.  Our focus was a common goal and we helped each other to achieve it.  Thinking of work groups this also varies depending on if I am meeting with my ESE team which is made of up many people of my grade level team which is just a few of us.  My grade level meetings adjourn with jokes and well wishes and maybe some comments about personal events that may be coming.  Our ESE meetings typically end with going over the list of who we will look at the following week and who is responsible for collecting each needed piece.  This becomes a very stressful  time as we are all quickly writing down what we are responsible for and hurrying onto our next responsibility.

I often find it difficult to leave my grade level team as we stay late after school and get so much done.   We have an agenda and each team member takes a piece of the lesson planning and begins working.  The time goes  by very quickly and family obligations slowly claim each of us and we leave one by one.   This transition can be difficult as you don't want to place too much of the work into your peers.  Making sure that we each are pulling our weight is typically how these meetings end making sure that everybody is good to go for the following week.

After this weeks assignment I see myself taking time for a moment of self reflection before adjourning.  If we can take the time to reflect on what we have accomplished we will be more focused on getting the work completed.  This will also give us a chance to come together and talk about some common ground.  I will suggest that we capture some best practices and discuss what we would like to keep and what we would like to change for next time. This will assist me in looking at the well being of the team not the other 4 steps which focuses more on achieving the goal.
Adjourning is an essential stage of team work as it gives the team an opportunity to come together once again and celebrate their accomplishments.  It also gives a time for reflection of the process as well as giving each member an opportunity to speak about their team experience.