Challenge: How do we make real work when we have standards we are required to "cover" and "teach?"
One of the eight essential elements of project-based learning is significant content. Clustered standards across all disciplines, weaving together content that reflects the way we learn as adults. But how do unpack those standards with our students? We are used to delivering content with direct instruction, with a video, with a worksheet, and maybe some inquiry. But with project-based learning, we uncover the deeper learning with our students through a Need to Know. Teachers facilitating discussion, empowering students to ask questions and figure out by themselves what it is they need to learn.
Here is a little peek into Studio 1. For their study on plants earlier this year, students discovered the natural community outside of EPiC and spent time as a community brainstorming and naming the important concepts they wanted to learn in order to become experts.
This past month, Studio 1 embarked on a quest to discover what it was to be a leader. Students began their study by unpacking the question, "What is a Leader?"
After discussion and inquiry, students decided they wanted to interview various leaders in the community, both adults and high school students, to learn what it means to be a leader and what it entails to actually lead others. After a series of interviews with community members, students reflected on their own leadership abilities--how had they lead in the past, how were leading now in the present, and how did they they hope to lead in the future. Students wrote personal essays about their leadership abilities and crafted their own handmade books to publish their writing. Students also identified ways they could lead and share with others, such as as a talent or something they felt they could teach others. Having learned to write a procedure (peanut butter and jelly sandwich), they wrote and produced video tutorials to help and lead others.
