Project-Based Learning, the final chapter
At its most basic, education is about ownership. Students are not just studying History or algebra. They are engaged in ‘building a self,’ which is the only company they will have for the rest of their lives.
The ‘self’ that each individual student is building (with our help) must include more than test-taking, listening to lectures, and spitting back what the teachers and the textbooks have put forth.
Done well, project-based learning is a wonderful way to ‘build a self.’ It gives students more control over what they are learning, engages them in the process of creating knowledge, teaches teamwork, leadership, and other interpersonal skills, and reinforces the basic underpinning of a quality education: reading, writing, speaking, and working with numbers.
I’ve been writing about this for the past four weeks, and now I want to try to answer questions about evaluating projects: How are projects graded? Because it’s a group effort, does everyone get the same grade? What if a couple of students aren’t pulling their weight? What if the project fails?
But before I go there, one more point: Projects can be entirely classroom-based, or they can take students out into the world. Two quick stories.
1. After deciding they would survey the community about its pressing needs, fourth graders in Yellow Springs, Ohio, built a portable kiosk, which they set up in a CONTINUE READING: Project-Based Learning, the final chapter | The Merrow Report