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Have your students ever told you they didn't want the school day to end because they were having so much fun? That's what project-based learning does to kids; it makes them want to keep working, keep learning, keep searching for answers and exploring with their minds.
Project-based learning has so many shapes and forms, from building bird boxes and observing residents during the nesting season, to playing a tag game to understand the concept of predators and prey, to creating a puppet show to learn about the Underground Railroad, to researching human impact on coral reefs, creating a physical model of a coral reef (learning about different species of coral in doing so) and then having a culminating mock trial to save an island's healthy reef from human development.
These types of projects allow kids to really immerse themselves in learning. Instead of being given notes or simply reading and doing worksheets, PBL goes much deeper. It allows kids to use multiple intelligences, to wrap their minds around an in-depth concept and to think about it at multiple angles.
Organize your own PBL unit with this free planner. Click the button below:
While project-based learning is flexible and open ended, there are some key characteristics and steps to keep in mind while planning a unit.
Define a problem to solve by posing a question or having your students come up with the question(s)? When they create the question, they are immediately invested into figuring out potential answers. Think about interesting questions to prompt kids to deeper issues, like "How do humans impact coral reefs?" or "Why does the US spend more on health care than most nations, but has some of the sickest people?" or "Does nature help kids concentrate?"
Brainstorm and organize your thinking using graphic organizers, goal setting and action items. How will they being to explore this topic? What resources will be needed? Do we need to contact experts in the field or visit an actual location? How will information be gathered? Will students work independently, in small groups or as a class, each working on different aspects of the topic?
Project-based learning tends to be self-directed, meaning students get voice to decide the direction of this project. They may wish to gather information in multiple ways, depending on their learning styles such as interviews, primary sources, reading, etc. Once they have thought about different ways of gathering information, students can then decide what they want to do with it, including an end goal, outcomes, and more. In this model, teachers are there to guide, but student inspiration leads the way!
Research is a must for PBL as students need to learn first-hand about a new topic. This can be done through reading, through interviewing, visiting museums, etc. Staying organized by having a research folder for each child with specific note sheets such as graphic organizers, checklists and timelines may be very helpful. Help students by modeling note-taking methods, checking in frequently and sharing some of your own research so they can see that adults do research too!
Collaboration is really important in PBL. While students can certainly work alone for parts, often times the target is a bigger project at the end. For example, some student may work on certain components, such as different related topics (subtopics). If the topic is a coral reef study, some students might begin by researching different kinds of corals, while others may dive into what makes a reef healthy or unhealthy, while others may spend time locating various reefs around the world. While students may decide to research on their own, ultimately this type of learning lends itself nicely to come back together and share findings to create something like a model coral reef, with detailed labels about the different corals, additional information about the health of reefs using charts and graphs, and even perhaps an interactive atlas illustrating the healthiest and unhealthiest reefs around the world.
Learning outcomes and goals can be magnificent ways to show off all that is learned. Perhaps students really wanted to learn these objectives:
What makes a healthy coral reef? Why aren't all reefs healthy?
What are many examples of various types of coral?
How are humans impacting the health of coral reefs?
To showcase the various information they learned, students could decide together a final project. Do they want to have a mock trial representing a hotel developer chopping down acres of mango trees that help protect the reef while others are representing environmental groups on the island? Do they want to create a living museum where students share the models of coral they built, while verbally talking about the differences between the coral and how each helps the environment? Do they want to turn the classroom into a coral reef where they focus on the interaction between other animals and plants nearby, including the interdependent food web?
Encourage students to embrace and learn specific vocabulary on their topic. I love to create a separate space in their folders for vocabulary words. My students were recently researching the fast-food industry, and we learned words like "industrialization", "commodity crops", "GMOs" and so on.
Project-based learning is truly authentic learning in action. Students young and old love projects. When kids are engaged in doing projects there is deep learning going on that lasts a lifetime. While some teachers are stuck in the fast-paced world, having to blow through teaching standards and cover content for the approaching state tests, progressive and homeschool educators are SO blessed with the freedom to go at your students' paces. If this type of learning sounds amazing to you, but you don't know where to start or you simply don't have the time to put these kinds of lessons together, visit my site where I do the work for you!
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