Project-Based Learning

Well once again time got away from me, and it has been a week and a half since I reflected on my work with my Grade 10 students on our advertising campaign simulation.

For those of you who did not read my initial post, I am working with students to create advertisements that warn against the dangers of distracted driving. The advertisements will be submitted to the Just Drive! Contest sponsored by Allstate Insurance. I was fortunate to be able to work with our Division Learning Technologist Jim Swan on the project, and he brought with him a class set of iPads for our use (yes, we are one of the last remaining schools on the planet that does not have any iPads available for student use). He spent 2 classes with the students- one describing the project, and the second introducing students to the technology. Students were able to choose from creating an image, a song, or a video. The tools we chose to show were iMovie (link is to an 8 minute tutorial on iMovie for the iPad), Adobe PhotoShop Touch, and Garage Band. Students were given a quick lesson on each of the apps, and then asked to decide the direction they would take with the project.I chose to let students work alone or with a partner of their choice on this project. I made this decision with great deliberation, and I was quite pleased with the choices they made.

Students had 4 class periods to work independently on their projects. It never ceases to amaze me how much work these “independent” work periods are for the teachers. I seemed to be pulled in a million different directions and bombarded with questions each and every period. I kept trying to remind myself of the learning that was taking place.

I am always surprised at how exhausting yet rewarding Project-Based Learning can be! When I debriefed the project with Jim, we discussed how students need to be deprogrammed from their need to be so reliant on the teacher. Most students rely heavily on teachers to provide them with ideas, direction, and answers. Very few are what I would consider independent learners. I was amazed that students would wait 15 minutes to ask me a question, when their answer could have been found almost immediately with a quick Google search. I wondered to myself, when do we become independent learners? When I have a question, I find the answer myself, and I really want to work with my students to try and do the same. It is such a valuable life skill.

My question then is, how can we encourage our students to be more independent in their learning? How can we take the onus off of the teacher to be in control of the learning?

One thought on “Project-Based Learning

  1. I would agree with you that I think so many of these creative inquiry based projects seem to make me work harder, so I’m not sure that I have the answers. Last year, I did an inquiry based project with my students and I was really disappointed in the results. So, I decided that I needed to get rid of some stuff, make it less complicated, and focus on one aspect of the project. I think it was better this year. It still needs some tweaking, and I think that’s what we do in education. We look at things that didn’t work or didn’t quite work the way we thought it should and we tweak and try again. You might get some tips from this: http://www.edutopia.org/project-based-learning.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *