Project Based Learning.

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EST 200, Project Based Learning
MEC
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Contents

• Introduction.
• Definitions.
• Types.
• Role of a Tutor.
• Role of a Student.
• Criticisms.

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• The teacher is not in the school to impose
  certain ideas or to form certain habits in the
  child, but is there as a member of the community
  to select the influences which shall affect the
  child and to assist him in properly responding to
  these.
• -
  John Dewey

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Introduction

• Student-centered pedagogy.
• A style of active learning and inquiry-based
  learning.
• Involves a dynamic classroom approach.
• Students acquire deeper knowledge through active
  exploration of real-world challenges and
  problems.
• Contrasts with paper-based, rote memorization, or
  teacher-led instruction.

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Introduction

• Students work for an extended period of time to
  investigate and respond to a complex question,
  challenge, or problem.
• John Dewey one of the early proponents of
  project-based education.
• Dewey introduced the idea of "learning by doing.
• William Heard Kilpatrick built on the theory of
  Dewey, introduced the project method.

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• "Project Based Learning integrates knowing and
  doing. Students learn knowledge and elements of
  the core curriculum, but also apply what they
  know to solve authentic problems and produce
  results that matter. PBL students take advantage
  of digital tools to produce high quality,
  collaborative products. PBL refocuses education
  on the student, not the curriculuma shift
  mandated by the global world, which rewards
  intangible assets such as drive, passion,
  creativity, empathy, and resiliency. These cannot
  be taught out of a textbook, but must be
  activated through experience.
• - Thomas
  Markham (2011).

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Projects

• Primary vehicle for instruction in project-based
  learning.
• No commonly shared criteria for what constitutes
  an acceptable project.
• Vary greatly in the depth of the questions
  explored, the clarity of the learning goals, the
  content and structure of the activity, and
  guidance from the teacher.

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Projects

• Projects can guide the entire curriculum or
  simply consist of a few hands-on activities.
• Can be multidisciplinary or single-subject.
• Some projects involve the whole class, while
  others are done in small groups or individually.

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Project Based Learning

• Engages students to invent and to view learning
  as a process with a future instead of acquiring
  knowledge base as a matter of fact.
• Learning not to focus on memorization.
• Greater depth of understanding concepts, broader
  knowledge base, improved communication and
  interpersonal/social skills, enhanced leadership
  skills, increased creativity, and improved
  writing skills.

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Project Based Learning

• A type of instruction, where students work
  together to solve real-world problems in their
  schools and communities.
• Students to draw on lessons from several
  disciplines and apply them in a practical way.
• Promise of seeing a very real impact becomes the
  motivation for learning.

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Project Based Learning

• Emphasis on long-term, interdisciplinary and
  student-centered learning activities.
• Emphasis on students' collaborative or individual
  artifact construction to represent what is being
  learned.
• Students to organize their own work and manage
  their own time in a project-based class.

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Project Based Learning

• Opportunity to explore problems and challenges
  having real world applications.
• Increased possibility of long-term retention of
  skills and concepts.
• Real-world problems capture students' interest
  and provoke serious thinking.
• Students acquire and apply new knowledge in a
  problem-solving context.

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Project Based Learning

• Projects present a problem to solve or a
  phenomenon to investigate.
• Students become active digital researchers and
  assessors of their own learning.
• Self-directed learning from students doing or
  making throughout the unit.

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Project Based Learning

• Development of students' problem solving and
  creative making of products.
• Deeper understanding of key concepts and mastery
  essential learning skills such as critical
  thinking.
• Not just "an activity" (project) that is stuck on
  the end of a lesson or unit.

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Features of Project Based Learning

• Is organized around an open-ended driving
  question or challenge.
• Creates a need to know essential content and
  skills.
• Requires inquiry to learn and/or create something
  new.
• Requires critical thinking, problem solving,
  collaboration, and various forms of communication.

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Features of Project Based Learning

• Allows some degree of student voice and choice.
• Incorporates feedback and revision.
• Results in a publicly presented product or
  performance.

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Types of Project Based Learning

• Challenge-Based Learning/Problem Based Learning
• - an engaging multidisciplinary approach
• to teaching and learning.
• - encourages students to leverage the
• technology they use in daily lives.
• - students to solve real-world problems
• through efforts in their homes, schools
• and communities.

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Types of Project Based Learning

• Place-Based Education
• - immerses students in local heritage,
• cultures, landscapes, opportunities and
• experiences.
• - learning through participation in service
• projects for the local school and/or
• community.
• - lays foundation for the study of language
• arts, mathematics, social studies,
• science and other subjects.

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Types of Project Based Learning

• Activity-Based Learning
• - students construct their own meaning
• through hands-on activities.
• - constructivist approach.

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Roles of a Tutor

• Projects present a problem to solve or a
  phenomenon to investigate.
• Teacher to play the role of facilitator.
• Teacher to work with students to frame worthwhile
  questions and structure meaningful tasks.
• Focus on both knowledge development and social
  skills.
• Teacher to assess what students have learned from
  the experience.

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Roles of a Tutor

• Instructional framework allows teachers to
  facilitate and assess deeper understanding rather
  than stand and deliver factual information.
• Project Based Learning to replace other
  traditional models of instruction such as
  lecture, textbook-workbook driven activities and
  inquiry as the preferred delivery method for key
  topics in the curriculum.

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Roles of a Tutor

• Teachers to facilitate self-directed learning.
• Teachers to guide student learning so that
  students learn from the project making processes.
• Instructor role as a facilitator.
• Instructor to develop an atmosphere of shared
  responsibility.

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Roles of a Tutor

• Instructor to structure the proposed
  question/issue so as to direct the student's
  learning toward content-based materials.
• Instructor to regulate student success with
  intermittent, transitional goals to ensure
  student projects remain focused and students have
  a deep understanding of the concepts being
  investigated.

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Roles of a Tutor

• Students held accountable to their goals through
  ongoing feedback and assessments.
• Assessment and feedback to ensure the student
  stays within the scope of the driving question
  and the core standards the project is trying to
  unpack.
• Instructor to track and monitor ongoing formative
  assessments that show work toward requisite
  standard.

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Roles of a Tutor

• Instructor to evaluate the finished product and
  the learning that it demonstrates.
• Assessments to guide the inquiry process and
  ensure the students have learned the required
  content.
• Keeping complex projects on track while attending
  to students individual learning needs requires
  artful teaching.

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Student Roles

• To ask questions, build knowledge.
• To determine a real-world solution to the
  issue/question presented.
• To collaborate and expand active listening
  skills.
• To engage in intelligent, focused communication.
• To think rationally on how to solve problems.
• To take ownership of their success.

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Student Roles

• To learn to work in a community.
• To take on social responsibilities.
• To become more independent since they are
  receiving little instruction from the teacher.
• To learn skills that are essential in higher
  education.
• To expand their minds and think beyond what they
  normally would.

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Student Roles

• To find answers to questions and combine them
  using critically thinking skills to come up with
  answers.
• To resolve their understandings of the phenomena
  with their own knowledge building.
• To help students to see the broader contexts
  where theoretical concepts and mathematical
  equations may apply.

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Criticisms

• Social loafing as a negative aspect of
  collaborative learning.
• Insufficient performances by some team members.
• Lowering of expected standards of performance by
  the group as a whole to maintain congeniality
  amongst members.
• Most teachers tend to grade the finished product
  only.

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Criticisms

• Social dynamics of the assignment may escape the
  teacher's notice.
• Transforming the curriculum into an over-reaching
  project or series of projects does not allow for
  necessary practice of particular mathematical
  skills.
• Mathematics is primarily skill-based at the
  elementary level.

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Criticisms

• Outcomes not measurable using standard
  measurement tools.
• Reliance on subjective rubrics for assessing
  results.
• Tendency for creation of the final product of the
  project to become the driving force in classroom
  activities.
• Project can lose its content focus and be
  ineffective in helping students learn certain
  concepts and skills.

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Criticisms

• Academic projects that culminate in an artistic
  display or exhibit may place more emphasis on the
  artistic processes involved in creating the
  display than on the academic content that the
  project is meant to help students learn.

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• "Project-based learning is a comprehensive
  perspective focused on teaching by engaging
  students in investigation. Within this framework,
  students pursue solutions to nontrivial problems
  by asking and refining questions, debating ideas,
  making predictions, designing plans and/or
  experiments, collecting and analyzing data,
  drawing conclusions, communicating their ideas
  and findings to others, asking new questions, and
  creating artifacts.
• -
  Blumenfeld et al.

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Thank You