BWP Session 2 ~ Keeping Your Project on the Rails

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Better with Practice: PBL Implementation Tips from the Field
March 4
2 p.m. and 5 p.m. PST
Share Ideas
Join us in the group PBL~ Better with Practice
in Classroom 2.0
www.classroom20.com/group/pblbetterwithpractice

Raise Hand Send Message Talk Polling Whiteboard Tools A Quick Orientation A Quick Orientation

Better with Practice: PBL Implementation Tips from the Field A group-sourced webinar series about making the most of project-based learning. Three sessions, each repeated at 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. PST February 18 How to Create a Culture of Inquiry March 4 Keeping Your Project on the Rails March 11 It’s Not Over When It’s Over: The Project Spiral

Our Sponsor
Project Foundry
Project Foundry is a proven online project based learning management system built by practitioners who understand the value of the pedagogy and inherent need for a streamlined tool that engages students and ensures meaningful academic results.
[insert gfx here] http://projectfoundry.org

Let’s Warm Up: Discuss in the chat… How might a project go off the rails … for your students? … for you? So, what do you do?

Better with Practice: PBL Implementation Tips from the Field Your Hosts Suzie Boss and Sponsor Jane Krauss

PBL ~ Better with Practice Today’s Guests Neil Stephenson Calgary Science School Calgary, Alberta Sue Boudreau Orinda Intermed. Orinda, CA Lisa Parisi Denton Avenue Elem. New Hyde Park, NY Nichole Kotasek Minnesota New Country School Henderson, MN

Today ~ Keeping Your Project on the Rails
Act 1: Launching In and Letting Go
Spotlight: Neil Stephenson
Act 2: Building Project Chops
Spotlight: Sue Boudreau
Act 3: Scaffolding Success
Spotlight (A): Nichole Kotasek
Spotlight (B): Lisa Parisi

Act 1: Launching In and Letting Go Connie Weber, describing the launch of a project: “ For the teacher, there's this giant Letting Go. Now, that requires some effort. I can see it in my mind—it's me walking away, turning my back, going somewhere else, not allowing myself to hover. It's me communicating, ‘I'm at your service,’ and, ‘May the force be with you.' It's me utterly and totally handing over the reins, let come what may. The project is theirs .”

Act 1: Launching In and Letting Go Photo courtesy Connie Weber George Mayo expands on letting go: “ That's the beauty, and excitement, of PBL in my opinion. It's not only a leap of faith, but it also has a lot to do with trusting your students and knowing that they will rise to the challenge.”

Launching In and Letting Go Spotlight: Neil Stephenson
Professional Development and Outreach Coordinator,
Calgary Science School
600 students, grades 4-9
1:1 laptop school
I love this job because I get to support teachers in designing rich, inquiry-based learning projects.

Launching In and Letting Go The Cigar Box Project
Students lived the disciplines of historical thinking, information literacy and graphic design as they used 21 st - Century tools to reinterpret events from Canadian History.

Letting Go… http://thinkinginmind.blogspot.com/2009/04/cigar-box-project.html

Act 2: Building Project Chops
Why projects are a work in process
How milestones help us manage
And a reminder that students and teachers need time to practice project skills

Act 2: Building Project Chops Tip: Students may need to start with the junior version, but still benefit from playing the whole game

Building Project Chops Spotlight: Sue Boudreau “ Young people can make a difference to tomorrow’s world. We’ll help you show them how.”

Building Project Chops Business Project Management for Class Projects
Start with the end in sight:
Students use their rubric to grade projects from last year (and/or an example I made) Pre-teach some skills: ppts, work flow charts, team work

Building Project Chops The Chicken Paprika Plan
1. Define 'success'
All parts of dinner ready at 6.30pm.
Food doesn't get cold
Tastes good
No one gets food poisoning!
2. How would I measure success ?
All parts ready at 6.30, cooked.
All dishes at least 60 deg. C.
Guests finish what's on their plate, some ask for seconds or the recipe.
No one reports throwing up.
3. List tasks and time
4. Organize into a work flow sequence
5. Find the "critical path"
6. Plan ‘backwards’
©Sue Boudreau 9.10.09

Building Project Chops Project Management Steps
Brainstorming tasks and times on Post-its
Work flow charts, critical path
Who does what by when - action plans
Timelines and working backwards
Interim deadlines in hmwk agendas. Parent sign off
Log books
Doing it!
Check-ins with journals, evidence of progress i.e., photos, receipts, parent notes
Poster presentations
See Sue’s handouts on PBL~Better with Practice

Act 3: Scaffolding Success
Kim Trefz on finding the right structure:
“… no ‘instructions’ on how they were going to solve their problem but just the steps for forming a hypothesis, coming up with a problem statement, using Diigo to bookmark their research, weighing the pros and cons of their solution.
There are steps needed to ensure that students are going through the entire process for being great problem solvers and developing great habits of the mind.”

Act 3 - Scaffolding Success Spotlight (A) Nichole Kotasek As an advisor at Minnesota New Country School, Nichole is honored to have the opportunity to learn as much from her students as they learn from their projects.

Scaffolding Success QUOTE [PF Screen shot] It's great to be able to go to the 'Students' page and see where every student is on every project within one click. -Riverbend Academy Mankato MN Project Foundry

Act 3 - Scaffolding Success Spotlight (B): Lisa Parisi
=
Using many tools:
Class wiki
Student blogs
Podcasts +more
…and observing

Wrap Up and Reflect

It’s the PBL Express! Get outta the way! State-of-the-art All aboard, baby! Efficient

Fine-tuning Our Practice
Next slides - More “fine tuning” gems from members of PBL~Better with Practice
Last slides - Guest resources
Please thank our sponsor, Project Foundry www.projectfoundry.org Host a free webinar in the Learn Central Elluminate room www.learncentral.org There’s more…

Fine-tuning Our Practice
From Kevin Gant:
Start a project or inquiry with a conversation, NOT the project description. Through a conversation, you can get at student interest, start to understand their prior knowledge, and you prime the pump for presenting the central question of the project so that it will be best received.
Are you revisiting this conversation throughout the project?

… More Fine-Tuning
From George Mayo:
It's important to use every second of class time wisely, and unless you have clear deadlines and timeframes, students will start to slack off. One complaint from my students is they feel like they often don't have enough time. I like it when I hear that. I always want them to have a real sense of urgency as they work on each step along the way.

..and More Fine-Tuning
Kyla asks for suggestions to get students to think independently:
So many of them are too willing to let me or other students tell them "the answer."
Sue Boudreau offers an inquiry activity:
Primary kids use their senses to predict what’s in a paper bag. What does did it feel like? Is there more than one thing inside it? What’s the evidence? Does this new evidence support their last guess? And on like this, until... the denouement. Potatoes. The class was ecstatic because someone had guessed correctly.
Fine tuning: A small activity, used over and over with different objects, sets the class room culture around it being OK to guess, to be wrong, try again. A lot of inquiry is about making being wrong a GOOD thing.

Let’s Continue the Conversation
Add questions, comments in Classroom 2.0 group: www.classroom20.com/group/pblbetterwithpractice
Another live event—March 11
It’s Not Over When It’s Over: The Project Spiral

Resources
Act 1 Links
Cigar Box Project: http://thinkinginmind.blogspot.com/2009/04/cigar-box-project.html
Neil Stephenson’s blog: http://thinkinginmind.blogspot.com
Act 2 Links
Sue Boudreau’s Take Action Project:
www. takeactioncurriculum .com
www. takeactionscience . wordpress .com
www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Take-Action-Science-Project-Curriculum/199857622102?ref=nf
Act 3 Links
From Lisa Parisi:
http: //herricks . org/webpages/spcollaborative/
http: //lisaslingo . blogspot .com/
Reinventing Project-Based Learning blog:
http://reinventingpbl.blogspot.com
Project Foundry:
http://projectfoundry.org

BWP Session 2 ~ Keeping Your Project on the Rails

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