Category: PBL

Honestly I struggled with the technological learning curve for our ALST 600 Alaska Studies. The tech heavy project-based learning approach was way out of my comfort zone. Having never used a mac, done blog posts or worked with software like iBooks author, the technology was a serious barrier to being able to adequately and confidently present the information required for the iBook in the condensed time frame of this course. I also struggled with the amount of group work the iBook required. After some reflection I am thankful for the community this group project-based learning built within our cohort, small groups and later in the peer review.  As these smaller groups created space to have real discussion and get to know our classmates in a more intimate and safer setting than the whole class discussion.

The project-based learning approach does have a lot to offer. We were given the freedom of picking a region and a topic, which created ownership and hopefully the opportunity to choose a topic of study that truly interested us. I feel that choice can be a strong motivator and way to engage student, as opposed to spoon feeding information through lectures.

Perhaps if we had more time and  there was an opportunity to establish more of a base knowledge in our topic of research, Alaska Studies, I would have felt better about this experience. Especially since this was the introduction to Alaska for a whole cohort of future Educators within Alaska.

I can’t say enough about how much I’ve learned in these past three weeks. Project-based learning makes so much sense in a so many ways that I find myself frustrated with many of my past teachers who were much bigger fans of memorization and lectures. And I can understand where both have their place, but to use solely one or the other seems dangerous when the potential for leaving behind kids who don’t learn well under the method presented.

I do feel like I learned a lot from the other students in my class, and I learned a lot about myself. This is the kind of environment I hope to emulate in my future classrooms–all classrooms should be a place for open and respectful discussion and learning.

On top of this, I think the approach of working smart to avoid burnout is a really good one, and creating student-driven projects has the double bonus of forcing students to learn along with you, rather than watching you tell them what you’ve learned. It’s the same adage for writing: show, don’t tell. I look forward to helping students build their skills for learning.

One critique is that I do wish we’d been able to present our regions’ intros to the class, to show what we’d learned but also to see what other people had learned too. I think I learned a lot about Southeast Alaska but not much about anywhere else. So that would be one thing I hope future classes get a chance to do.

But seriously, thanks for the experience. I can’t believe how much we got done in three weeks!

As a future teacher and educator, it would be naive of myself to say that I did not take anything away from this group project. I learned a lot about giving my students the opportunity to work on a project in class, and how important that is. It is a great chance for students to be able to ask each other questions, see what their classmates are doing, and also to be able to ask the teacher questions. This is important as I think with all of the options available to them in class, it can help the project take the next step and become that much better.

The one thing that I did not like, was I felt like we were rushed fairly quickly at the end. This was especially evident during the proof reading stage, I would have liked more time on this section and so I think I would give my students more time. I liked the idea of doing this though because it also gave the students a chance to learn more about english proof reading.

I did enjoy the idea of the project too because it forced us to learn about something by ourselves, just as Peter said, this is how someone who has no idea about Alaska history, teaches Alaska history. Overall what we accomplished was pretty amazing, and I am overly glad that we not only accomplished it, but glad that I learned so much while doing it. All I can say is, thank you Peter.

I’m thankful for the project-based learning approach in Alaska Studies. I thought it was effective and gave me a deeper understanding on the region we focused on. I just wish we had more than three weeks to engage with our groups and acquire more information. Even though iBooks was frustrating at times, it was not a boring and meaningless class. People in my group were actively working and I often felt bad because others took on more responsibility than me. Project-based learning allowed us to dig deep into the region and I think we gained more knowledge than how we would have through lecture. I don’t know what it’s going to be like in the classroom this fall, but I’m already planning on how I can engage with the students. I believe finished work has better quality when the students are working together and are able to communicate with their instructors well. But like Angie said a few days ago, these classes aren’t going to be over when the three weeks are up. This is only the beginning. I can already envision all the hours that are going to be spent on researching each lesson plan. Research itself wasn’t too bad. Trying to organize the entire information into one condensed lesson plan was the toughest part. I believe it’s going to be very useful though in the long run.

What did the teacher in me learn?

Last semester, I had to teach a class on a subject I didn’t know much about. My class got switched at the last minute, and I ended up taking on a business writing class that I didn’t feel at all prepared to teach. As I always do when I get thrown a class at the last minute, I asked everyone I could think of for ideas, and my coworkers ended up steering me toward a mostly project-based approach as the best way to handle the situation. My students started by doing individual presentations and then put together two group presentations, with the last one functioning as the final. As far as I could tell, the class went well; we had a fun class dynamic, and the groups all seemed to get along and share work reasonably equally.

This class was an interesting chance to see project-based learning from the other side – to be a member of one of the groups. Having done the project, I have more mixed feelings about project-based learning than I had before. I think it’s a great way to motivate students – I know I went into high gear as soon as I heard the word “publish,” and I think my group as a whole produced a much higher level and volume of work than we would have without that word. What I realized, though, is that an entirely project-based approach makes it difficult for the teacher to control the overall vibe of the class. I was very lucky, last semester, to have a class where we all got along well and there were no complicated group dynamics (that I knew of, at least). Here, I think we all had the best intentions, but there were still clashes, and that makes me wary of making a single group project the central focus of a class.