I have had my students do "batabualary" for Dracula. The students draw and color a bat. Then they were given a vocabulary word from the play that they had to illustrate and define. THAT was a project! I have done project based learning where we were doing a WWII unit. We read poems, short stories and The Diary of Anne Frank. At the beginning of the unit the student pulled a topic from a hat that related to WWII. They had to create a digital project on that topic. It ranged from WWII fighter jets and pilots to the Holocaust. It was a dual project with their history teacher too. It took 6 weeks. We worked in the classroom, at home and in the library. In between I made sure that every topic that was pulled out of the hat was discussed and they were told the relevance to the material we were reading.
That is the main importance of PBL. You have to make it relevant to whatever you are teaching at the moment. Luckily I had tons of guidance from another teacher and the history teacher. We encouraged and assisted the students right through the projects. Some were excellent, others mediocre and some were practically non-existent. The grades were given and we had 100s to 25s. It was awful. I hated that students just didn't do the work. There has to be a way to connect to every student. There is -- you will connect with every student, just not every time.
I think that is the point of PBL. Students do not learn the same way. Not all students are capable of doing amazing art PBLs, digital PBLs or even writing PBLs. You have to find a way to help a student find the information they need to learn. It takes trial and error. Do I know everything about PBL? Heck no! I enjoyed trying though. As much success as I had with the WWII project, I had a huge failure. It was awful -- really awful and very public! Yet, I learned what the students were not able to do. Not because they can't, but because they needed to be shown what to do. I just didn't prepare them for the project. I am not sure what the students learned from the failure - but I sure learned a lot. Preparation is the key. A lot of preparation.
When PBL works -- it is amazing and when it fails... well, that can be amazing too! Those students will always remember my failure. We laughed and did our best. We had fun and we learned. And to me that is what PBL is all about.
Hi Gina! I liked reading about your first-hand experience with PBL. It's nice to hear the truth, that PBL is a lot of work for the teacher and it can turn out really good or really bad. You said that some students do better with art PBLs, some better with writing PBLs, and some better with digital PBLs, was your WWII PBL only a digital PBL or were the students given a choice of the medium in which they could do the PBL? Thanks for your honesty in your post. It encouraged me that sometimes you have to try new things as a teacher and they will not always work the first time, but to always learn something from the failure and try again.
ReplyDeleteHey Sarah! Thanks for your comment. The digital project was completely digital. They could incorporate other items, but it had to be able to be digitized. Like, they could use photos or drawings but they had to be transferred into the presentation (like a slideshow or voice thread).
ReplyDeleteYou definitely have to be willing to fail as a teacher. Everything will not work and what works once may not work again. There is nothing like learning from failure though! Actually it may be the best teacher!
Yes, not every plan succeeds. That is how we learn. Groups help. The variety of skills and backgrounds lessens the possibilities of failure. Icurio provides lots of options for every project. Students can choose. When they have a real choice they usually perform at a much higher level.
ReplyDeleteAnd the more you do it, the better you are at designing a successful learning event!
Thoughtful. Interesting. Personal. Well done.