Project-based learning
Project-based learning is a teaching method that involves a dynamic classroom approach in which it is believed that students acquire a deeper knowledge through active exploration of real-world challenges and problems. Students learn about a subject by working for an extended period of time to investigate and respond to a complex question, challenge, or problem. It is a style of active learning and inquiry-based learning. Project-based learning contrasts with paper-based, rote memorization, or teacher-led instruction that presents established facts or portrays a smooth path to knowledge by instead posing questions, problems, or scenarios.
History
is recognized as one of the early proponents of project-based education or at least its principles through his idea of "learning by doing". In My Pedagogical Creed Dewey enumerated his beliefs including the view that "the teacher is not in the school to impose certain ideas or to form certain habits in the child, but is there as a member of the community to select the influences which shall affect the child and to assist him in properly responding to these". For this reason, he promoted the so-called expressive or constructive activities as the centre of correlation. Educational research has advanced this idea of teaching and learning into a methodology known as "project-based learning". William Heard Kilpatrick built on the theory of Dewey, who was his teacher, and introduced the project method as a component of Dewey's problem method of teaching. Kilpatrick endorsed project-based learning in his 1918 essay The Project Method, calling for "whole-hearted purposeful activity proceeding in a social environment". The essay was immediately lauded by progressive educators.Some scholars also associated project-based learning with Jean Piaget's "situated learning" perspective and constructivist theories. Piaget advocated an idea of learning that does not focus on memorization. Within his theory, project-based learning is considered a method that engages students to invent and to view learning as a process with a future instead of acquiring knowledge bases as a matter of fact.
Further developments to project-based education as a pedagogy later drew from the experience- and perception-based theories on education proposed by theorists such as Jan Comenius, Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, and Maria Montessori, among others.
Concept
In 2011, Thomas Markham described project-based learning as follows:Problem-based learning is a similar pedagogic approach; however, problem-based approaches structure students' activities more by asking them to solve specific problems rather than relying on students to come up with their own problems in the course of completing a project. Another seemingly similar approach is quest-based learning; unlike project-based learning, in questing, the project is determined specifically on what students find compelling, instead of the teacher being primarily responsible for forming the essential question and task.
Blumenfeld et al. elaborate on the processes of Project-based learning: "Project-based learning is a comprehensive perspective focused on teaching by engaging students in investigation. Within this framework, students pursue solutions to nontrivial problems by asking and refining questions, debating ideas, making predictions, designing plans and/or experiments, collecting and analyzing data, drawing conclusions, communicating their ideas and findings to others, asking new questions, and creating artifacts." The basis of Project-based learning lies in the authenticity or real-life application of the research. Students working as a team are given a "driving question" to respond to or answer, then directed to create an artifact to present their gained knowledge. Artifacts may include a variety of media such as writings, art, drawings, three-dimensional representations, videos, photography, or technology-based presentations.
Another definition of project-based learning includes a type of instruction where students work together to solve real-world problems in their schools and communities. This type of problem-solving often requires students to draw on lessons from several disciplines and apply them in a very practical way and the promise of seeing a very real impact becomes the motivation for learning. In addition to learning the content of their core subjects, students have the potential to learn to work in a community, thereby taking on social responsibilities.
According to Terry Heick on his blog, TeachThought, there are three types of project-based learning. The first is challenge-based learning/problem-based learning, the second is place-based education, and the third is activity-based learning. Challenge-based learning is "an engaging multidisciplinary approach to teaching and learning that encourages students to leverage the technology they use in their daily lives to solve real-world problems through efforts in their homes, schools and communities." Place-based education "immerses students in local heritage, cultures, landscapes, opportunities and experiences; uses these as a foundation for the study of language arts, mathematics, social studies, science and other subjects across the curriculum, and emphasizes learning through participation in service projects for the local school and/or community." Activity-based learning takes a kind of constructivist approach, the idea being students constructing their own meaning through hands-on activities, often with manipulatives and opportunities to experiment.
Structure
Project-based learning emphasizes learning activities that are long-term, interdisciplinary, and student-centered. Unlike traditional, teacher-led classroom activities, students often must organize their own work and manage their own time in a project-based class. Project-based instruction differs from traditional inquiry by its emphasis on students' collaborative or individual artifact construction to represent what is being learned. Design principles thus emphasize "student agency, authenticity, and collaboration."Project-based learning also gives students the opportunity to explore problems and challenges that have real-world applications, increasing the possibility of long-term retention of skills and concepts.
Elements
The core idea of project-based learning is that real-world problems capture students' interest and provoke serious thinking as the students acquire and apply new knowledge in a problem-solving context. The teacher plays the role of facilitator, working with students to frame worthwhile questions, structuring meaningful tasks, coaching both knowledge development and social skills, and carefully assessing what students have learned from the experience. Typical projects present a problem to solve or a phenomenon to investigate. Project-based learning replaces other traditional models of instruction such as lectures, textbook-workbook-driven activities and inquiry as the preferred delivery method for key topics in the curriculum. It is an instructional framework that allows teachers to facilitate and assess deeper understanding rather than stand and deliver factual information. Project-based learning intentionally develops students' problem-solving and the creative making of products to communicate a deeper understanding of key concepts and mastery of 21st-century essential learning skills such as critical thinking. Students become active digital researchers and assessors of their own learning when teachers guide student learning so that students learn from the project-making processes. In this context, Project-based learning is units of self-directed learning from students' doing or making throughout the unit. Project-based learning is not just "an activity" that is stuck at the end of a lesson or unit.Comprehensive project-based learning:
- is organized around an open-ended driving question or challenge.
- creates a need to know essential content and skills.
- requires inquiry to learn and/or create something new.
- requires critical thinking, problem solving, collaboration, and various forms of communication, often known as 21st century skills.
- allows some degree of student voice and choice.
- incorporates feedback and revision.
- results in a publicly presented product or performance.
Examples
Another example is Manor New Technology High School, a public high school that since opening in 2007 is a 100 percent project-based instruction school. Students average 60 projects a year across subjects. It is reported that 98 percent of seniors graduate, 100 percent of the graduates are accepted to college, and fifty-six percent of them have been the first in their family to attend college.
Outside of the United States, the European Union has also providing funding for project-based learning projects within the Lifelong Learning Programme 2007–2013. In China, Project-based learning implementation has primarily been driven by international school offerings, although public schools use Project-based learning as a reference for Chinese Premier Ki Keqiang's mandate for schools to adopt maker education, in conjunction with micro-schools like Moonshot Academy and ETU, and maker education spaces such as SteamHead.
In Uganda since the introduction of the new lower curriculum, students and teachers have been urged to embraced project based learning especially with training from the Ugandan Government and UNELTA