Introductory Blog Topic (Eric Dodge)

I think that the group was very successful in the fact that we accomplished the task of aligning ourselves into a square. When we were finished everyone had both hands on the rope and we were in the shape of a square. I had done this activity before and in that group we were unable to align ourselves in any shape that resembled a square. But this time the activity took a while and there was a lot of confusion. I think that I was successful as part of the group, which was successful. But individually I do not think that I was very helpful. At the beginning of the activity I was only allowed to answer questions because I had done this before. But even after I was allowed to talk, I did not do much communicating. I always called out my number and tried to help the people directly around me a little bit, but I never addressed the group as a whole. I think that the main goal of the exercise was really to communicate well as a group in a difficult situation. In that respect I do not think I was successful as an individual, and neither was the group collectively.
I probably could have been a little more vocal and tried to help people get a little more organized, once I was allowed to talk. This may have helped the people that had never done the activity before. It would have been beneficial for the group to start the activity more efficiently. The first problem was that the rope was tangled when everyone closed their eyes. So we had to untangle the rope before we could even begin to make the square. This was made more difficult by the fact that most of the people did not even know that the rope was tangled. The other problem was that no one or two people emerged as leaders that people would listen to. If a few people would have emerged as leaders, I think the group would have listened to them and we would have been much more organized. At the beginning of the activity I was unable to talk so I could not have emerged as a leader, but later on I definitely could have. I am not especially proud of myself for anything that I did during the exercise, because I know I could have done a lot more to help. I am happy that I was able to help the people around me a little bit, and in the end we ended up in a pretty good square, so I am proud of the group as a whole for that.