Blog Post #9

What Can Teachers and Students Teach Us About Project Based Learning?

This question has almost innumerable answers. So many teachers and students have been/are in a class where project-based learning was the primary/only form of learning. PBL has had so many successes that it's very hard for today's teachers to ignore it. It is a way of making the classroom more fun and educational. Many people are unsure just how to incorporate this form of learning into their classrooms. In this post, I will discuss some sources that helped me understand this. The first is an article titled Seven Essentials for Project-Based Learning. This article discusses ways to effectively incorporate project-based learning into your classroom. A few of the biggest points include providing a driving question, allowing the student to have a say in the project, and providing feedback and revision.

The video Project-Based Learning for Teachers is a neatly created way of further explaining why project-based learning is so important and useful. One of the main points the video points out is that project-based learning teaches students the four C's: collaboration skills, communication skills, critical thinkning skills, and career and life skills. These skills are vital for students to understand and use because they are skills they will need beyond school.

PBL: What motivates students today is an adorable, funny, and eye opening video featuring several students talking about what motivates them in school. First they talk about what motivates them in general, and then they were prompted to talk about how their teachers motivates them. They talked about things all the way from clip charts to food reinforcement. This type of motivation is key when using project-based learning in the classroom.

Ten Sites Supporting Digital Classroom Collaboration In Project Based Learning is a very resourceful website that list 10 websites that would be very handy in a classroom using project-based learning. My favorite website this blog mentions is Lino. The blog explains this website best:

"Imagine an electronic classroom display board. One that could leave the classroom and be visible on any computer screen anywhere. Now, dream about the ability to create it in minutes using multi-color post it notes, pictures, drawings, web links, and even videos. Better yet… kids can contribute by being given a URL… no login needed! Best of all it is fast, easy to use, and dependable."

This is definitely a website I will use in my future classroom.

In the video, Students solve old problem with new ketchup cap, shows us to very creative high school seniors who created a new cap to install in ketchup bottles to avoid the watery substance that often comes out. This genius creation was done at their school, which would not have been possible if the teacher had not provided the kind of environment to do so. This is exactly what the outcome of project-based learning should look like.