PBL: No I don't mean Peanut Butter & Lemons

PBL or Project Based Learning is another trend that is popping up all over classrooms. A properly planned PBL is where the teacher becomes the facilitator of learning and the students are taking responsibility for what and how they learn. It requires 21st century skills and often mimics what students will have to do in the workplace as adults. PBL's require planning and preparation on the teachers part. For the students it requires perseverance, collaboration, team work, problem solving, higher level thinking skills, math, writing, reading, speaking, listening, integration of technology, creativity, and much more.

Before MSED 678Z I knew very little about PBL. I had read about it in a few books, know a teach who teachers at a project based school (which is very cool), and had a general idea about what it was. It wasn't until I was required to think about and break down the PBL process that I truly understood how hard it would be for teachers and students who had never done this type of learning to do it. I decided to plan a PBL based on our current social studies unit: Pioneers. I am grateful to work with amazing teaching partners who agreed to join in and my entire 4th grade team is taking part in this Pioneer PBL. 96 students, two monolingual and two duel language classrooms, are having students investigate what their lives would be like in 1869. They were given this driving question, rubrics for presentation, participation, and research. They have one month to work and come up with how they are going to present their information.

As the teacher I am just the facilitator. I give them guiding questions, conference with them to help keep them on track, provide materials they need, and encourage them to dig deeper and check their work. I worked hard to give them opportunities like making candles, building houses with Lincoln Logs, making butter, and learning to sew a button. We also arranged for a field trip where they will live like a pioneer for an entire day. All of these things are my job as the facilitator. They will take what they've learned and experienced and put it into their final presentation.

This has been such a rewarding experience. Watching them work together, have conversations, debates, helping one another whether it was with a tech issue-understanding a concept they were reading, or dealing with some of the deeper issues they came across (slavery); they have risen above any expectation I had set for them.

I am very thankful to have learned about this and that this class gave me the tools and incentive to try something new. I've included some of the work that we've done in case this has inspired you to try your own PBL.

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