PBL Learning Team

A group of Teachers met today at Kelly Road to discuss Project Based Learning. We've ordered BIE's PBL Starter Kit as a resources and will be working through that together as a way to inform and evaluate our practice. We've also started a blog dedicated exclusively to the group. Its online here. 

One of the things we did was share our questions. Here's what we came up with:

• What questions do we have?
• How does PBL work?
• How does PBL benefit our students?
• motivation
• engagement
• success
• building core competencies (thinking, communicating, personal and social competency)
• Definition of “The Educated Citizen” (we heard this recently and understand its in the BC school regulations, but do not know where)
• literacy and numeracy foundations
• understanding rich content
• core competencies
• How do we cover curriculum through PBL?
• What is “true PBL”, is there “true PBL”?
• How much information is required before students jump in?
• How much Teacher Direction/ Guidance is needed?
• How do we facilitate and let students drive?
• What role do driving questions play?
• How do we come up with really good driving questions?
• What skills and experiences do students bring to projects?
• How do different disciplines come together in projects?

We agreed its the highlighted questions that matter most. Its the difference this way of learning makes in the lives of our students that matters most. We want to be intentional about evaluating our practice based on the difference it makes for students. We are excited to be learning together!

What questions do you have about PBL?

cross posted at: http://sd57learning.blogspot.ca/

Student and Parent Survey on PBL and BYOD

This month wraps up the first year of our Project Based Learning (PBL) Choice Program, the Northern Learning Centre. In the last few weeks of classes we gave students and parents the opportunity to share their perspectives on Project Based Learning as well as our Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) model. Here's what they said (click here view the .pdf in its own window):

KRSS Garden Update

Well Prince George has shown signs of summer and our KRSS Garden is one of them! Student`s have been excited to get their plants transplanted into containers in the garden, and also to start some new seeds in the garden itself too. We have planted cabbage, spinach, tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, beets, cucumbers, potatoes, onlins, carrots and strawberries, The students have also constructed an automated watering system.

As the students have dug their hands into science they`ve been forced to think critically at every turn. First, student`s each put together a care plan for their plants. Next, student`s designed an experiment they can run in the garden. They are all responsible for their plants, making their own decisions about watering, containers, location in the garden, soil and fertilizers, and how to measure the plants overall health. In some ways the project has been made even more interesting by the fact that we won`t be able to harvest from each of our plants. Students have been forced to ask themselves what conditions are necessary to first, keep their plants alive, and secondly encourage their growth.

For me the research process has been particularly exciting, as many students have been able to swap stories and ask questions of friends and family as part of their inquiry. I`d love to see the KRSS Garden become a project that really pulls together the school community and local community as well.  Art Knapps, our local garden store, has been very supportive and we`ve enjoyed working with them. We`ve also been in touch with the Enhanced Forestry Lab at UNBC and hope to get there next year to see their work first hand.

In addition to the science experiments students are running the project has also involved a number of products in their Tech class. So far students have build an 8` by 16` greenhouse and gardening tools. Plans are in the works for storage containers, shelves, benches, expansions to the watering system, plant hangers, and planter boxes.

The project its taken us in a few unexpected directions. Some students who did not have successful plants are now experimenting with composting, and gaining a better understanding of how to compost effectively at the school; other students have brought a passion for sustainability to the project, and have enjoyed the upcycling of 5 gallon buckets and packing pallets in the garden. We saw a great community garden underway at Science World, and are excited to see the Alterrus vertical urban garden as well. 

Student Samples Demonstrating Communication Competency

Summarizing Projects:

• Joslynn's post on over-consumption project

Reflective Thinking:

• Conor's pinhole camera critique

Encouraging Other Students to take action:

• Gabe's post on Shoreline Cleanup
• Chelsea' safety poster in Tech

Presenting the Northern Learning Centre Choice Program to Others:

• Student's answer questions about the NLC

A Brilliant Hook

• We often start a class after a break with a catch up activity, or some kind of icebreaker. A few times now we’ve asked students to summarize their time off in three words. Once the presenter has shared a volunteer is randomly selected from the audience to ask a question based on the three words. Most students use a combination of adjectives to describe various activities and events. One student in particular has mastered the hook. His face was full of enthusiasm as he shared that he had had the “best weekend ever!” Every student in the room was filled with curiosity and almost competing to be the one to question him further. The explanation that followed did not disappoint.

Defining BC's New Cross-Curricular Competencies: Part 1 - Communication

http://www.sd20.bc.ca/tl_files/images/bcedplan_logo_rounded.jpg

This year I've been on an exciting journey toward a more holistic approach to education. I firmly that we as educators need to ensure that we are developing the whole child, and we are developing their potential in such a way that they can apply themselves wherever they choose in the future. That takes more than content knowledge.

My Teaching partner and I have made a concerted effort to embed the BC Ministry of Education's Cross Curricular Competencies in everything we do. Our students have developed rubrics on these skills, have self assessed them, have been assessed by us and others, have told stories of ways in which they've demonstrated them, and are now using them as labels for their blog posts. In our upcoming report cards we will be including our students own comments on their competencies and their own personal goals. We are excited and encouraged to look back at what they've come up with.

I am proud to say that I have also been invited to participate in a working group to help define these draft competencies. The Ministry of Education is welcoming feedback on the current plans for Transforming BC's Curriculum. I encourage you to check it out and provide feedback to them directly, or let me know what I can pass along on your behalf.

Ron Berger's "An Ethic of Excellence"

I've really enjoyed Ron Berger's "An Ethic of Excellence: Building a Culture of Craftsmanship with Students".

As a young Teacher it's refreshing to hear from a colleague who has committed his career to Excellence and who has seen great rewards. I am always looking for ways to motivate my students to produce their best work, and I think the tools Ron suggests are powerful in accomplishing that task. I've become a firm believer in each of the tools Ron chooses:

• Multiple Drafts
• Critique
• Making Work Public
• Using Assessment to Build Stronger Students

After experimenting with these tools and reading Ron's presentation of them I am even more excited to train my students in their use as we develop a culture of craftsmanship. "An Ethic of Excellence" is well worth a read. 

Students Striving for Excellence!

One of the great rewards in life is pride in a job well done. Our students experienced that pride as they shared their work at our Student Exhibition of Learning at the end of January.

Some wished they had put more time and effort into their work, but for many the exhibition was a pay off for the hard work that had been done revising their work and preparing it for presentation. It was incredibly exciting hearing the way the students talked about the exhibition and hearing them explain just how good it felt to show off their work.

We look forward to our Students Individual Presentations of Learning at the end of the year when they will be able to present a collection of their best work to friends, family, and community members. Please let us know if you are interested in seeing one or more of these presentations. They will take place June 17th and 18th, 2013.

Cross Posted at: http://nlc.sd57.bc.ca/?p=207

Take Aways from High Tech High

After seeing and experiencing High Tech High, here are some of the things that stand out in my mind:

1. Pride of Ownership: The Students at HTH are proud of their community, their school, and their work. They know and understand their community intimately, and can describe their involvement in it. They have a connectedness with their school that goes beyond the physical. Their years at HTH are preparing these students for their future, and they will tell you why and how. Finally these students take great pride in their work. Student work covers the walls and hallways at HTH: the cleanest wall I saw there was one students had just finished mudding, sanding, and repainting after dismantling the vertical garden they had build on it. 
2. The Strength and Pervasiveness of the HTH Brand: The High Tech High culture is robust, even in when school is out! Students, Teachers, and Administrators will all tell you the ways in which Peer Critique, Student Exhibitions of Learning, Student Presentations of Learning, and Internships have become foundational in their lives as learners. Everyone has bought into these essential elements, and they are working well! Much of it comes from Work that Matters: A Teacher's Guide to Project Based Learning. 
3. Students before Curriculum: Its evident that in designing projects and student work that Teachers are primarily concerned with students engagement and excitement. They want their students to create a product that they will connect with, and take pride in. They want each project to allow for :
4. Personalization: student voice and choice
5. Differentiation: access and challenge for all learners
6. Adult World Connection: authentic interactions with adults in the world beyond school

These are the factors that I saw making the biggest impact on student learning at High Tech High. True the context was Project Based Learning, but I would saw the projects work in conjunction with these elements and are not the driving force behind the school's success. 

I am just getting into Prensky's Teaching Digital Natives: Partnering for Real Learning and would say the Pedagogy he's preaching very much falls in line with the Pedagogy of HTH. Don't let the name of the school or the title of the book mislead you, its not about Technology.  

PS. I apologize if these links are broken. The HTH site was down when I was drafting this post. Leave a comment and I will try repair them later (It's not about the Technology)

Photo Credit: http://heres-how.weebly.com/uploads/4/4/9/9/4499967/2603906.png

More is better!

A great article from an excellent site on PBL. Lots of good suggestions to engage students in deeper thinking and more authentic tasks. One of the ideas is that "More is better". I was convicted with their criticism of projects that ask students to take information from one place and put it somewhere else. I think we've all been guilty of assigning these kinds of projects all too often. I'm encouraged not only by the possibilities a truly project based classroom will have to engage students in deeper thinking, more authentic tasks; but also the possibilities of projects that lead to bigger questions, more learning and more projects!
7 Essentials for Project-Based Learning | FreeBIEs | Tools | Project Based Learning | BIE