Sarah Golightly Course 3, Blog 4—PBL Article
The article I’ve chosen is “Five
Strategies for Fostering a Collaborative Culture in a PBL Classroom.” James Fester identifies the following as ways
to produce a productive PBL class: make
sure team members know what is expected of them, Create norms and roles,
monitor progress constantly, celebrate, allow informal cohesion.
My favorite of all these is celebrating
little successes. Truthfully, I don’t
think we can build our children up enough.
There will possibly be decades of discouraging words, so why not have
many days sprinkled with happiness and encouraging acts/surprises. PBL is new
to me and probably new to the children also.
Everyone is going through a struggle and any uplifting action could help
to push a child or group onward to producing a quality product.
Next, the team really does need to know what is
expected of them. I think the students
will perform exactly what is expected of them.
As an educator, we must first have a clear goal and explain it multiple
times and in multiple ways. That way excuses
will not have any ground to stand upon.
I can say that after a year of PBL, I know that expectations will be extremely
clear in the future
Sarah,
ReplyDeleteI agree with you about celebrating the little successes. This is really important when digging in PBL because for most students this will be a struggle since this is such a foreign concept. It won't always go so smoothly and students will hit those roadblocks. But if we focus on the positives of what they have been able to accomplish and learn, that positive feedback will help them be more willing to try this again.
Hi Sarah,
ReplyDeleteI am glad that this article was helpful to you and I agree 100% with you that students and teachers alike benefit from encouragement and intentionally providing this within the pbl unit can help motivate. I also agree with you that having clear goals and expectations.
Sincerely,
Dawn
Your comment ... "students will perform exactly what is expected of them," is so true. I tell myself if there is apathy in the classroom I must be contributing to it. So I must be proactive in making a change. If I don't like cell phones out in my ninth grade classroom then do something about it. I do believe the atmosphere of the classroom can be enhanced by a teacher.
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