Towards Project Based Learning - The Long and Winding Road

Deadline? What Deadline? Part 2

The second reason I don't think students make deadlines is related closely to the first (see previous post) and deals with motivation.  Students won't bother practicing there time management skills or manage distractions, if they are not motivated to learn.   Even with GCSE's or GNVQ's the motivation to pass doesn't kick in for many until the final final final deadline is staring them in the face.    So how do we motivate them to want to meet that deadline?   I've already mentioned in the previous post, why I think sanctions don't work.   The learning dispositions required to meet a deadline are difficult, just as the learning concepts related to quadratic equations can be difficult.    We work with students who are having difficulty with meeting deadlines so why don't we do the same with students developing time management skills?   

At the Academy, I'm hoping to introduce the notion of "Graduation Stages" for students.  Click here for Graduation Stages  Initially they will be in the PBL programme, but I'd like to extend it across the whole academy.  Each stage, progresses through degrees of independence and participation in the planning and organisation of learning.   At stage 1 (Asteroid)  students have a far more traditional education.   They are in front of the teacher much of the time, and given very structured tasks.   The whole purpose of this stage is to try and enable the students to graduate to Stage 2 (Moon).   I am hoping that the vast majority of students will have graduated to Stage 2 by the end of the induction to the new programme.   Graduation can only occur when students show that they have developed specified dispositions for learning.   I am hoping that the majority of our students will be working at Stage 3 (Planet) by the end of Year 9.   At this stage the students will have the opportunity to plan much of their learning with the teacher (learning facilitator) and will share in deciding on what should be assessed.   They will also be able to work in ways which suits them, independently, without the need for frequent direct supervision.    I've included a Stage 4 (Star) because we want students to reach for the stars.   This ideal student will really be able to choose what they learn, when and where, drawing on the menu of learning opportunities we can provide and what the learning resources they can create for themselves.   At present, logistically we don't have the means to cater for Stage 4 students, but we'd like to think that our organisation of the curriculum will begin to address these needs.      This really is personalised learning, and will prove to be the most challenging aspect of the programme, especially as it begins to develop throughout the school.   

I'd like to think that by Years 10 & 11 our students really are able to manage distractions and plan their time more effectively.   Watch this space. . .   

Deadline? What Deadline?

For the past few years I've been teaching GNVQ courses.   They're an excellent vehicle for PBL.   Set deadlines/milestones, give feedback to students to enable them to improve their products/submissions, evaluate, move on to the next deadline or project etc etc.   It should work really well if you're an organised teacher.   I'm not the world's most organised teacher, but I do try to stick to deadlines or milestones and I really make sure I give student feedback, following milestones, to enable them to progress, but . . .  I fail miserably in keeping students to deadlines.  Why?  Because I feel pressurised to ensure I achieve the highest grades possible for my students.  Not for altruistic reasons, but because our school like every other school in the country is under pressure to achieve high grades.    We all know the anti league table arguments so I won't spend time on this, but suffice to say our students albeit unconsciously know that I'll extend deadlines.   

Come on all you GNVQ teachers, tell me how useless a teacher I am.   I know there will be a few out there who can keep to strict deadlines, but not many I guess and even less in inner city schools such as ours.   

So why is it so hard to keep students to deadlines?   I'd like to cover one possible reason in this post and another in the next. 

The first reason concerns lack of practice.    How many of us are good at meeting deadlines?   How many of us rush out a piece of work in oder to make a deadline?   The organisational and planning skills required to meet deadlines are high order dispositions, as is managing distractions.    As I've mentioned before we have to begin to develop habits in students.   By Year 10, when the pressure really begins to meet deadlines, students are suddenly required to switch these skills on.    Most schools practice some form of action planning or target setting, but how many subjects or courses in schools really incorporate milestones and deadlines into their curriculum from an early age?    How many address the meeting of these deadlines as part of the assessment criteria and discuss fully with students the reasons they didn't make the dead line?     I may be wrong, but I expect when deadlines are Incorporated, students get little more than a nag or a row for not meeting it.   Apply the same rationale to a difficult concept in a subject - say quadratic equations.    If a student struggles with this at first and doesn't manage to complete the problem, does the teacher give them a row or nag?   Probably not, because the teacher expects this and will sit down with the student to help them overcome the difficulty.   Why can't we apply this to deadlines?   Meeting deadlines is just another difficult concept/action to understand and fulfill  It's another thing to be learned through practice until it becomes unconscious.    Apply the same rationale to students who have been let out of class to go to the resource centre/library to do some independent study, but instead go off and muck about in the toilets.    Again it's a difficult thing for young people to manage.   Set free with friends?  What's the priority, work or "having a laugh"?    Invariably the students  are reprimanded and told not to do it again (or worse, they are not given the opportunity to go out again) when they come back with little to show.   The student has done wrong.   It's a pity that we don't regard these misdemeanors more seriously as part of the learning process and give the students the opportunity to practice the skills of time management, responsibility, and managing distractions/procrastination.   This is the main reason I want to begin the PBL programme at the Academy - I want it to address these dispositions and really explore with the students why (for example) they haven't met a deadline, rather than dishing out the detentions.   

In the next post, I'll look at the second reason why students have difficulties with deadlines.   

Why Project Based Learning?

I was asked today at a middle leaders meeting why I wanted to introduce Project Based Learning (PBL) in the Academy.   "Isn't it a bit limiting, focusing on one aspect of teaching?" I was asked.   A fair question.   What we propose to introduce in the Academy is essentially PBL, but I wonder if this is the best term to use.    It does carry with it connotations of busy students colouring in and producing nice booklets or power point presentations with slick slide shows, but only if you look at PBL in the traditional sense; the type of projects I did when I was at school.   We all had projects to complete at school.   I remember thinking it unfair how the people who were the best at art always seemed to achieve the highest grades.    The problem was, the projects were based on end results.

Nowadays projects like these still exist, but they are a minority.   The original GNVQ programme was an excellent example of how projects could be carried out.   The new DIDA programme (see DIDA Website ) is an excellent example of certificated PBL in Britain today.   The Learn to Learn programmes springing up around the country are addressing the some of the better aspects of PBL.

I don't see the type of learning and ways to facilitate learning, in any way limited by introducing PBL as the main structure or methodology for learning in the Academy.   I see it as expanding and broadening the scope of learning and the ways we facilitate learning.   A project provides a context and relevance; scope for collaboration with peers and between different subjects; an opportunity to personalise learning; a variety of ways to learn new knowledge and develop new skills; a means to develop new habits of learning.   

In PBL, projects do not have to have the same format.   We intend to have:

• Driving Questions
• mysteries; problems
• enterprising/creative programmes of study.   

Students will work in a variety of ways in each project.   They will:

• work in different teams (learning about the nuances different combinations of people can bring to a team) from project to project
• Carry out team or individualised planning
• create their own resources and share them with others (Using Wiki's)
• develop their own e-portfolio and blog, recording their progress in terms of the development of their habits of learning.   
• research in teams or individually
• attend more formalised, direct instruction or training (seminars)
• Take responsibility for instructing other team members
• Play a much bigger role in assessing their own learning

In PBL teachers will take on a new role.  They will:

• become coaches and facilitators of learning
• be responsible for ensuring students reflect on and discuss their progress
• ensure assessment focuses on the process at least as much as the outcome.   
• act as a guide and mentor.   

In short - PBL can incorporate all the excellent pedagogy that has emerged over the past 10 years and more importantly ensures students have the opportunity to take part in a more rel event, active and stimulating curriculum, which addresses the needs of the 21st century learner.   

The big question is:   Will PBL motivate students who have real difficulty in switching on to learning?   What can we do to ensure such a programme continues to capture the imagination of our students?   I hope to explore this in the next blog

The files below expand on the issues and comments above:

Initial Proposal  This file outlines the initial proposals for the new PBL programme.   It is useful in terms of highlighting some of the issues I anticipated.

http://armandod.typepad.com/OutcomesfromContentmeeting20thFeb.doc This file contains minutes which outlined possible projects the programme will cover.

http://armandod.typepad.com/OutcomesfromSystemsmeeting21stFeb.doc  This file contains minutes from a planning meeting which looked at systems and related issues.   

http://armandod.typepad.com/SummaryofProgramme.ppt  This is a power point presentation which takes you through the structure of the programme.   

Project Planning Form   This form is adapted from the Buck Institute for Education's project planning guide.   (See http://www.bie.org/pbl/)  The form should be read in conjunction with the guide lines below.

Project Planning Guide   This guide will explain the form more fully.