My Son Learned Group Work Sucks!

My son is a good student.  He goes to class, pays attention, does his homework and anything else he can to earn an A for his efforts.  He was well on his way apparently to accomplishing that goal until my wife got his report card on parent/teacher night.  As it turns out, he got six "A's" out of eight classes.  The one "B" he got was in math as he adapts to a new teacher and challenging subject which he was cool with cuz it meant he has to work harder and ask questions for clarification.  The "B" that did trouble him was in his science class due to a low grade on a GROUP PROJECT.  As it turns out, my son did his part of the project and did it quite well because he checked with my wife and I as to the quality of his work.  We agreed he had done his best and helped his team by doing his part.  On the other hand, his team mates did not have the same commitment to their part of the project and the team got a "B" as well and that dropped his grade enough in the class to earn a "B" at this point.  The kicker is that my son tried to control his destiny by motivating his other team members to do their best.

When all is said and done, here is what my son learned from his science teacher, GROUP WORK SUCKS! and there are slackers in the world that do not have the same dedication to their studies as he does.  I believe that was not in the lesson plan for the group project but a result of it nonetheless.  Of course, the science teacher is all "fat, dumb, and happy" that he had the kids work together on a project.  And has YET to ask my son about his experience in that situation which would make him the wiser when it came to assigning future group projects -- or so one would hope. 

So here is my question today.  Are you that science teacher?  Are you doing anything at all to enable students to have a successful experience when working in teams or do you just drop that assignment off on them without any guidance from the beginning to the end. If so, you are teaching what my kid learned in middle school this week -- GROUP WORK SUCKS!