I’m using TBL, for the first time, in an intro to macroeconomics course.  Would be interested in hearing from any co-conspirators, who teach economics.

All is going well except that students seem to be doing way too much foot dragging during the in-class exercises.  I pass out or describe the exercise and too many of them want to “negotiate” about what exactly I want.  Then they want clarification.  Then, after warnings that they need to finish we have to wait because “we still need to write out our graph.” 

We have a large number of remedial students, and that may explain some of this.  What I’m looking for are tips on how to get more productivity/learning out of the team exercises.  My feeling is that I’m doing pretty well on Larry Michaelsen’s main points of designing activities that require specific choices, with simultaneous reporting (if I could get more cooperation on that). 

Perhaps I need a way to hold the groups more accountable for foot dragging and not paying attention.  Perhaps by doing this incrementally, I could make groups feel accountable for paying attention without provoking a revolt.  For example, (1) “Does everybody get the assignment?” (and if not, another group is asked to explain so that the rest of the class gets to express their frustration at the foot draggers), (2) “Who is not done?” (with the implicit question being, if all others are finished, why not you?), I could implement this accountability without provoking a revolt.  My feeling is that being too strict won’t work because then the offending group will disrupt the class discussion.

Other tips?  Any silver bullets?

Thanks,    Fritz Laux, Northeastern State University.