groups writing papers

Before starting assignment 3, i thought writing a group paper -- in which 4 people write one paper -- would be extremely difficult and would end up horrible. And though I am not particularly pleased with our final product, i was surprised to find that writing a group paper was in some aspects easier than writing a paper by yourself. I knew that some aspects of writing a group paper would be easier and better in some ways (research, amount of ideas, etc), but I thought that the actual writing of the paper would end up a mess, mainly because everyone has different writing styles. However, what I found was that once one person begins a part of the paper and the other group members have had the chance to read it, the tone becomes apparent to all and the members can pretty accurately achieve relatively the same tone and style. Still, it is sometimes hard to communicate ideas to the other group members . You know sometimes where you have an idea in the back of your mind but you don't know how to put it into words.. but then as you continue to write your paper you suddenly find a way to fit it in? When writing as a group, it is hard to develop your thoughts enough about the paper as a whole since you are so focused on the one section that you are supposed to write. Writing as a group is good in that you can see other people's ideas on paper, which is a much clearer way to communicate ideas than through verbal speaking, but the paper as a whole suffers because everyone is too intently focused on their own part. I think the ideal method would be for everyone to write the same paper with the same thesis and then one person rewrites the entire thing. This way, the writer has a chance to develop all of his thoughts and no "great" ideas are lost.