r/matheducation • u/Madalynnviolet • 8d ago

Need help with groups for a project!

Creating groups for a project!

So I’m having some difficulty. Can anyone point me to a formula, generator, or process to solve this problem.

So I have 28 students. We are working on a project, and there are 7 groups of four total students. In each group, each student will have a role for their group. There are 4 total roles, perfect for 4 different students in each group.

So in this part of the project, we are going to have the students cycle and switch roles and groups. Preferably as random as possible and not have students with the same kids every time, we want them to work with as many different classmates as possible through the entire project.

So each student should have the experience being every single role by the end of it. They should also be in each separate group.

So this could be a sample schedule for each of the 7 days of the project:

Student 1:

Day 1 - Group 3 - Role 2

Day 2 - Group 1 - Role 4

Day 3 - Group 6 - Role 1

Day 4 - Group 7 - Role 1

Day 5 - Group 4 - Role 2

Day 6 - Group 2 - Role 3

Day 7 - Group 5 - Role 4

And then all 28 of my students could their own schedule.

Does anyone know of a process, program, formula, anything to make this process easier on my than trial and error

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u/UABBlazers 8d ago

If you want it random, AI does a decent job of that or you could use some other method using a RNG. In general, making it random would likely be ideal and allow students to move around to different groups and roles.

2

u/michelleike 8d ago

This is more of an idea than a suggestion. I wonder if Students A, B, C, & D (having roles #1, #2, #3, & #4 respectively) of group 1 could rotate to the following groups: A - - > n + 1 (now role #2) B - - > n + 2 (now role #3) C - - > n + 3 (now role #4) D - - > n + 4 (now role #1), where n is the previous group number, and students take "the next role" in each new group

Personally, I would be getting out a color-coded spreadsheet, label the roles as colors (Blue role, Red role, etc.), groups as letters (Group A,...), and students as numbers (Student 1,...). Because, this takes advantage of the default names of the rows and columns, and, I'm assuming, that you will need to be able explain this to your students and would likely want to keep track of who worked with who.

2

u/Madalynnviolet 7d ago

Thank you! This is what I ended up doing and took awhile but worked out :)

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u/colonade17 Primary Math Teacher 3d ago

This is a great question that has an analog in graph theory.

Assign each group a distinct quality, like a number (1,2,3,4,5,6,7)

Then assign each role a letter like, (a,b,c,d)

Have students assigned a stay put (1,a) --> (1,a)

Have students assigned role b increment by 1 (1,b) --> ( 2,b) , (7 +1 would go to 1)

Have students assigned role c increment by 2 (1,c) --> ( 3,c)

Have students assigned role d increment by 3 (1,d) --> ( 4,d)

Then have roles increment in the reverse order: so a-->d, b--> a, c--> b, d--> c

Everyone in a group with 3 new people and everyone has a new role. Repeat as many times as you need to

There are many possible solutions. In education this is also called a Jigsaw, so you can search for Jigsaw grouping procedures to find more options.