Problem-Based Learning or Just Another Project? Use This Checklist to Find Out A few days ago I posted Amy Mayer’s comparison between assigning projects and developing project-based learning in the classroom. Due to its immense popularity, I decided to do some more research on helpful charts for teachers trying to implement PBL in their classrooms, and was thrilled to come across this checklist from the good folks at BIE: This checklist is a fantastic way to ensure that you are on the right track with shifting away from “doing a project” and moving towards project-based learning. Even if you are still at the planning phase, this is a great graphic to get you thinking about the essential elements you should include in your next project-based learning unit! Happy checking, y’all! Like this: Like Loading...
10 Apps For More Organized Project-Based Learning Project-Based Learning, by definition, is flexible. It encourages learner-centeredness, provides the possibility of more authentic work, and allows learners to self-manage and self-direct in places they used to have their hands held. But this has its drawbacks. Learning is a capacity-building endeavor that seeks to, well, build capacity will ironically depending on that same capacity to progress, There are a variety of ways to support students in project-based learning, including organized digital learning spaces that support creative thinking, collaboration, and ultimately project management. Below are 10 apps for more organized project-based learning. 1. Platform: iOS How It Can Help: Pure overkill for most classrooms, but if an extremely powerful productivity and project management is what you need and you’ve got a $50 iTunes card burning a hole in your pocket, this could be just what the doctor ordered. 2. Platform: iOS 3. Platform: Android & iOS How It Can Help: 4. Platform: iOS 5. 6. 7.
Why English teachers should care about project-based learning: multiliteracies, assessment for learning and digital technologies. | There is impetus for pedagogical change in the English classroom. Bull and Anstey (2010, p.6) observed that, ‘literacy teaching and learning should respond to the rapid changes in literacy arising from increasing globalization, technology and social diversity.’ This transforming social, cultural and technological landscape necessarily brings with it a new set of opportunities and challenges for secondary English teachers. Three such challenges include the purposeful integration of digital technologies into the classroom, the use of assessment for learning practices and the emergence of new literacies. The reshaping of traditional teacher-centred pedagogy to a more student-centred, inquiry-based pedagogy may assist Australian secondary English classroom with meeting these new challenges. One alternative pedagogy that may provide teachers with a scaffold to integrate digital technologies, assessment for learning practices and multiliteracies into the English classroom is PBL. Figure 1
11 Essential Tools For Better Project-Based Learning by Katre Laan from myhistro.com The rise of technology used in classrooms has made learning much more interactive. The emergence of iPads to browser-based tools in project-based learning, take teaching to a new level in the 21st century. Even the current trends in education include the use of new technology, from collaborative projects to blending traditional textbook teaching with innovative tools. For students, the core aim of project-based learning is to put theory into practice and gain new skills throughout the process. A major advantage of digital tools used is better engagement in the classroom. Browser-based tools and several apps used in education are especially useful for researching, storytelling and collaborative video making. Handy mobile devices allow students to be inspired when outside classroom by creating and sharing ideas and creations instantly. Here is a mini guide to some of the project based learning tools. 1) Mindmeister 2) Glogster 3) Myhistro 4) Pixton 5) Animoto
Six Affirmations for PBL Teachers All great teachers do great work. And not only that, but they also do different work. Great teachers are always looking to improve practice, steal ideas and try new things -- all in order to meet the needs of their students. 1) PBL Teachers Collaborate with Each Other Although PBL teachers often start out with projects in just their own subject area, most create integrated projects with teachers of other disciplines. 2) PBL Teachers Give Power to Students Through voice and inquiry, PBL teachers constantly reflect on how students can have more power in their learning environment. 3) PBL Teachers are Learning Environment Designers When PBL teachers engage in designing a PBL project, they are looking to create an engaging experience for all students. 4) PBL Teachers are Student-Centered PBL teachers know it isn't about them. 5) PBL Teachers Honor 21st Century Skills Through instruction and assessment, PBL teachers honor 21st century skills through true leveraging. 6) PBL Teachers Really Plan
Experts & NewBIEs | Bloggers on Project Based Learning: PBL Design Deep Dive –What Products, and How Many? When designing a project, teachers frequently ask, “Should my students/teams create:The same product with the same focus or topic?”The same product, but with a different focus or topic?”A different product with the same focus or topic?"A different product, but with a different focus or topic?” As you have grown accustomed to in PBL, there is no ONE “right” answer to this question. The “same product with the same focus or topic” is often a good option in the elementary grades, or in the secondary grades when the project has a narrow scope of content and/or short duration. One project that fit this bill was a math project designed to teach systems of linear equations and processes to collect, organize and represent mathematical data. The teacher asked the driving question, “How can we develop an evidence-based recommendation to the White Rock Marathon Committee regarding the use of MP3 devices?” I worked with a teacher once who wanted to “PBLize” his persuasive writing unit.
What Teachers Need to Know about Authentic Learning Authentic learning is learning in the "real world". It focuses on authentic deeds and students get to solve complex problems and find their solutions using a variety of activities like: role-playing, case studies, and collaborative peer learning. Authentic learning is idiosyncratic in its nature in that the setting where it takes place is multidisciplinary. In other words, the learning environment can be accommodated to foster different learning events. Now with the widespread of web technologies, more and more environments for authentic learning have been created. 1-Real-world relevance: Authentic activities match the real-world tasks of professionals in practice as nearly as possible. 2- Ill-defined problem: Challenges cannot be solved easily by the application of an existing algorithm; instead, authentic activities are relatively undefined and open to multiple interpretations, requiring students to identify for themselves the tasks and subtasks needed to complete the major task.
What Project-Based Learning Is — and What It Isn’t Screenshot/High Tech High The term “project-based learning” gets tossed around a lot in discussions about how to connect students to what they’re learning. Teachers might add projects meant to illustrate what students have learned, but may not realize what they’re doing is actually called “project-oriented learning.” Terronez, who teaches at High Tech Middle, a public charter school in San Diego, Calif says that when an educator teaches a unit of study, then assigns a project, that is not project-based learning because the discovery didn’t arise from the project itself. “If you inspire them to care about it and draw parallels with their world, then they care and remember.” For Terronez, the goal is to always connect classroom learning to its applications in the outside world. It takes a lot of diligent planning by the teacher to design projects that give students space to explore themes and real-world resonance to make it meaningful for them. Related
Practical PBL: The Ongoing Challenges of Assessment In recent years, most students in my project-based AP Government classes have indicated, in both class discussions and anonymously on surveys, that they prefer project-based learning to a more traditional classroom experience. They find PBL more fun and believe that it leads to deeper learning. However, two types of students often resist this model. Students of the first type generally do not enjoy school at all, and are looking for the path of least resistance. Both types of students benefit from the option of choosing their role in project cycles to increase motivation. Fair Assessment of Teamwork To increase buy-in for both types of students, the most important thing a teacher needs to do is help build individual accountability -- and, by extension, trust -- in student teams. 1) Individual Skill Areas I have developed an individual semester portfolio as the most important measure of a student's skills assessment. 2) Role-Based Assessment 3) "Weighted" Scoring