If you have any interest in engaging in a conversation with an individual who will challenge you to think harder and teach smarter, then you need to meet my friend Bud Hunt. Start with this bit of wisdom.
Learning isn’t something you do to somebody. It’s about creating opportunities. The learner has to, at some point, engage the experience.
Nicholas Provenzano (@thenerdayteacher) wrote a great blog post recently on why he thinks PBL is so effective with students. He focuses on five areas:
One of the lines I took away from the post includes:
“When the audience is larger, they want to impress everyone.” Amen.
Read the rest of the post here. Then, go follow him on Twitter. He’s worth your time.
This thought provoking video just might give you some ideas in direction you’ve been looking for.
Many of the conversations I have been in on and overheard at PBL training center around others on the campuses buying into the idea. In other words, what happens if I put in all this work and nobody buys into it along with me? Can I be a leader? How can I make this the movement for change what it needs to be?
Watch the first 3 minutes and 10 seconds of this video. It just might brighten your day and change how you feel about leadership.
Photo Credit: muffytyrone
You’re fired! Wherever project-based learning is introduced, students will come to a point where their teams don’t work together, can’t work together or won’t work together.
Tim Kubik, a BIE National Faculty Member, shares his thoughts around the idea of what happens when groups just don’t work out. Is it better to be proactive or reactive? Be sure to read his great blog post here.
Seth Godin, a marketing guru and all around deep thinker, published a great blog post back in May. He offered forth some thoughts on what we really should keep in mind when educating our high school students. As you’ll see, PBL attends to most of these rather nicely. Funny how one change in the classroom can do so much good for students after they graduate.
Honestly, many of the items on the list are ageless. They can be taught much earlier than high school so that by the time they get there, it is second nature. I’ll let you decide which of the ones I am talking about. Here is what Seth had to say:
What’s high school for?
Perhaps we could endeavor to teach our future the following:
- How to focus intently on a problem until it’s solved.
- The benefit of postponing short-term satisfaction in exchange for long-term success.
- How to read critically.
- The power of being able to lead groups of peers without receiving clear delegated authority.
- An understanding of the extraordinary power of the scientific method, in just about any situation or endeavor.
- How to persuasively present ideas in multiple forms, especially in writing and before a group.
- Project management. Self-management and the management of ideas, projects and people.
- Personal finance. Understanding the truth about money and debt and leverage.
- An insatiable desire (and the ability) to learn more. Forever.
- Most of all, the self-reliance that comes from understanding that relentless hard work can be applied to solve problems worth solving.