Robert Smith - Post 02

How does a “main course” project compare with the PBL Essential Elements?

There are eight PBL Essentials. Each component is intended to describe one part of the PBL process. These essentials are:

1)     Key Knowledge, Understanding, and Success Skills,

2)     Challenging Problem or Question,

3)     Sustained Inquiry,

4)     Authenticity,

5)     Student Voice & Choice,

6)     Reflection,

7)     Critique & Revision, and

8)     Public Product.

Coincidentally, there are eight “main course” project components. Projects designed to adhere to these components:

1)     are designed to teach significant content,

2)     require critical thinking, problem solving, collaboration, and various forms of communication,

3)     require inquiry as part of the process of learning and creating something new,

4)     are organized around an open-ended Driving Question,

5)     create a need to know essential content and skills,

6)     allow some degree of student voice and choice,

7)     include processes for revision and reflection, and

8)     involves a public audience.

Without doing a one-to-one analysis, I believe that it is obvious these two concepts are mimics of each other.

How will you ensure that your classroom is one where Project-Based Learning is the main course and not just the dessert?

            In the article, Larmer and Mergendoller (2010) address this question on a more holistic level when they state that “…moving from individual schools to mass implementation of main course Project Based Learning will require vision and leadership at the district, state and eventually, the national level” (4). For me to ensure that my classroom remains a “main course” PBL room, and not a “dessert” one, I must personally remain vigilant in my desire to see change take place. Also, I need to be supported by administrators and decision makers at the district level.

What supports will you need to make PBL a main course in your classroom?

Funding. Funding is always going to be the greatest challenge to education in the United States. Per Leachman and Mai (2014), “(s)tate education cuts have counteracted and sometimes undermined reform initiatives that many states are undertaking with the federal government’s encouragement, such as supporting professional development to improve teacher quality, improving interventions for young children to heighten school readiness, and turning around the lowest-achieving schools (7). They continue to postulate that these cuts in funding “…stymie education reform efforts by limiting the funds generally available to improve schools and by terminating or undercutting specific reform initiatives” (7).

How will you respond to colleagues and school leadership when they ask about your PBL intentions?

            My response will be, as it always has when someone has questioned my classroom methodologies, to look at my results concerning not only testing scores, but in the overall health and abilities of the learners I teach. I am successful. My students grow both socially and academically. This response may not be the humblest; however, it is the most honest.