To be successful in carrying out this plan I will need
resources that will help me guide teachers in producing PBL mini-units. I found
an article “Scaffolding Teachers’ Efforts to Implement Problem-Based Learning”
by Ertmer & Simons (2005/2006) that not only gave me insight into what
kinds of support teachers might need, but also resources to access that could
give me more information in the Bibliography. I have decided that I will come
up with actual scaffolds to help teachers plan PBL lessons. Because it is such
a huge task and there is so much information available to sift through, I think
giving teachers success in planning and carrying out a PBL mini-unit will
provide the impetus necessary for further work. I will also provide an Edmodo group that will
have links to articles, online resources and documents for teachers who want to
look more deeply into PBL.
The scaffolds I plan to start with are based directly on
information from Ertmer and Simons’ (2005/2006) article. They are: essential (driving)
questions (p. 5), locating/gathering resources (p. 6), creating student
ownership of the problem (p. 7), creating a collaborative classroom culture (p.
8), and assessment methods (p. 10). I also want to give a short overview for
teacher of what PBL is, why it is valuable for student learning and how it
might look in a classroom. Resources I have found that will do this include
this web page, What
is Project Based Learning (Stanfill, n.d.) , this video Project Based Learning:
Explained (Common Craft, 2010) and this guide Project-Based
Learning Professional Development Guide (Edutopia, 2007) . I may distill the
information even further to give teachers a clear but concise introduction to
PBL. I have found that teachers I have talked to believe that doing projects is
the same as project-based learning.
To give an idea of how I plan to scaffold teacher implementation
of PBL I will start with designing a worksheet for essential questions. One of
the resources listed in the bibliography of the Ertmer and Simons article
(2005/2006) provided a list of examples and non-examples of essential questions
(Quebec English School Network RÉCIT , 2005) . I will use some of
those in the initial scaffold for designing questions. Information in Developing
the Questions for Project-Based Learning (Kolk, 2011) includes an exercise
to determine the enduring understanding behind topics from a curriculum and a
quick description of what an essential question is. There are also links at the
bottom of the article to Wallingford Public Schools Enduring Understandings and
Essential Questions for Language Arts, Math, Science, and Social Studies which
provide great examples.
Image found: http://www.teachhub.com/reading-lessons-scaffold-texts |
I believe to make this plan a success I have to make PBL as
accessible as possible. Providing resources to help develop each part of the
plan, samples of exemplary components and explanations to give an overview of
the whole process are essential to making it accessible. It is a complex
process and requires a great deal of adjustment to teaching style, planning and
expectations of students.
References
Common Craft. (2010, December 9). Project Based
Learning: Explained. Retrieved from YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMCZvGesRz8
Edutopia. (2007, October 19). Project-Based
Learning Professional Development Guide. Retrieved from Edutopia: http://www.edutopia.org/project-based-learning-guide
Ertmer, P. A., & Simons, K. D. (2005/2006).
Scaffolding Teachers' Efforts to Implement Problem Based Learning. International
Journal of Learning, 319-328. Retrieved from Peg Ertmer's Virtual Home:
http://www.edci.purdue.edu/ertmer/docs/ertmer-lc05.pdf
Kolk, M. (2011, July 18). Developing the questions
for project-based learning. Retrieved from Tech4Learning Blog:
http://web.tech4learning.com/blog-0/bid/60418/Developing-the-questions-for-project-based-learning
Quebec English School Network RÉCIT . (2005). QEP
and ICT: Making the Connection Through Project-Based Learning. Retrieved
from LEARN Quebec:
http://www.learnquebec.ca/export/sites/learn/en/content/professional_development/workshops/documents/essquest.pdf
Stanfill, J. (n.d.). Personal Webpage, California
State University, Sacramento. Retrieved from What is Project-Based Learning
(PBL)?: http://imet.csus.edu/imet2/stanfillj/workshops/pbl/description.htm
Mary,
ReplyDeleteI made a long post on Friday and I do not see it. I did not save it in another file. Let me know.
Tami
Tami,
DeleteHere is the post from my email. I wonder why it didn't post.. I was able to copy it for you though.
Mary
I am including a few ideas that you can include in your Problem-based toolbox.
This is an excellent questioning tool kit. I had to work at helping the students to come up with good essential questions. Jamie McKenzie had some great examples.
http://questioning.org/Q7/toolkit.html
A Questioning Toolkit
Each district should create a Questioning Toolkit which contains several dozen kinds of questions and questioning tools. This Questioning Toolkit should be printed in large type on posters which reside on classroom walls close by networked, information-rich computers.
Portions of the Questioning Toolkit should be introduced as early as Kindergarten so that students can bring powerful questioning technologies and techniques with them as they arrive in high school.
Essential Questions
Subsidiary Questions
Hypothetical Questions
Telling Questions
Planning Questions
Organizing Questions
Probing Questions
Sorting & Sifting Questions
Clarification Questions
Strategic Questions
Elaborating Questions
Unanswerable Questions
Inventive Questions
Provocative Questions
Irrelevant Questions
Divergent Questions
Irreverent Questions
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Tami
Tami, thanks for the resources. The link to questioning.org is a good place for me to start with resources for teachers to develop questioning. Because of that link I got to thinking more about resources I need to find for my teachers which lead me to thinking about how to organize my thoughts, which lead me to thinking about concept mapping which lead me to find more online tools that I can share. I found one that might work for me very well (in addition to SpiderScribe). I don't know if you are familiar with it, it is http://www.wisemapping.com. There is also one more, http://www.exploratree.org.uk/ that is pretty cool for students.
DeleteMary
I also did it again yesterday and saved the link. I am not sure why, it worked last week. Thanks for putting it up Mary!
ReplyDelete