Blog Post 11

What can we learn about teaching and learning from these teachers?

In Brian Crosby's, Back to the Future, he showed us a few different ways he has used Project Based Learning in his classroom. He has great ways of making his students passionate about what they're learning. Students having passion and interests in what they're learning, goes a long way with how they will retain the information. Mr. Crosby had lots of different fun ideas for the students in his class. I really liked how different students from all over the world was wanting to do the fun projects in their classrooms that he done with his students. Mr. Crosby even Skyped with another teacher from New Zealand to show her how to do one of the projects. My favorite part of the video was when he showed how he incorporated Celeste into his class. Celeste is a little girl that has cancer and a weak immune system, so she can't physically go to class. Mr. Crosby Skypes her into the class so that she can participate with him and her classmates; the classmates are very accepting of Celeste, which shows how well of a job Mr. Crosby is doing with his students.

Mr. Paul Andersen came up with a great way to help his students learn. He explained his process in a video called The Blended Learning Cycle. He took two learning techniques (Blended Learning and The Learning Cycle) and blended them together to become the Blended Learning Cycle. He uses the word "quivers" to define the six steps he uses. Question...Investigation...Video...Elaboration...Review...Summary Quiz. He says in his video that he teaches his students how to go through a text book to find what they're looking for and actually know what they're reading. I think having this skill will be very helpful to students when they reach college age. I took too much time in my first couple of semesters trying to learn how to find information I was looking for and trying to learn how to use a textbook. That even goes hand in hand with finding things on the internet. They're both great resources for finding information and I think it is critical for students to learn how to do this at an early age.

Making Thinking Visible is a book written by Mark Church. In the Ad, it shows how he asks his students a driving question before getting deep into the lesson. After a couple of weeks, he asked the same question to see if any of their views have changed. He is making them aware of how they are learning, and ultimately making thinking visible to his students.

Here are a few more videos that do a very good job demonstrating how Projects Based Learning works.

Building Comics

Project Based Learning

Roosevelt Elementary's PBL Program

Project Based Learning allows children to explore more into what they are being taught. This ususally makes students more interested, which triggers better understanding about what they are learning. With Project Based Learning you can have a whole community come together to help students learn. Project Based Learning gives students real world problem solving skills to be able to think for themselves as they enter their adult life.