Propositions Project: 21st Century Skills Video Lecture | What is Project Based Learning (PBL)? - Professional Skills

the reason that this bill was created is
to put power in the hands of people but
what we're saying is that it's not gonna
put power the hands to people because
one it's not the people who get to
choose who gets to be district
recognizing that things are more complex
than they that first appear was what I
look for when in both the design of
projects as well as how the students are
working through a challenge
project-based learning I think completes
critical thinking to its next stage
which is okay well now that I've taken
this thing apart and and along the way
perhaps notice some of its laws in the
process of putting things back together
or an or and or putting him back
together in a way that was different
than they were before I'm now in
solution mode creation
one of the key dimensions of
problem-solving he'sjust persistence
which is something that a lot of
teenagers don't have the patience for
failure is going to occur because that's
something that doesn't we don't let
enough kids fail but then the
possibility to fix or to redeem that's
why I think good project-based learning
has got that sort of large-scale
multi-month multidisciplinary design to
it you know the students are gonna
stumble at certain points or or hit a
roadblock and by having that really sort
of authentic goal at the end it really
motivates the students to kind of bang
their heads against the wall a little
bit more until until they until they
figure it out one of the things that I
want students to when they think of
creativity innovation is to expand that
sense of the word beyond their first
connotations which is arts classes is
where you your creative English and
science and history those aren't
creative endeavors I think society often
has that kind of notion about creativity
I think that our the people that really
drive our economy however realize that
creativity's inextricably intertwined
with with problem-solving that this
century is about identifying problems
and that the only way you come up with a
solution is to be creative when those
young men when they start realizing that
women where their target voter and that
they were going to have to do some
thinking around how to make their
argument to that to those women and I
think that I think the creative stage
actually started there
focus less on mean if you're driving
like it for oftentimes collaboration is
an extracurricular students go out to
the sports field or they they go into
the theater or they go join the jazz
band and that's when they actually have
to engage in teamwork and the message to
them is collaboration is an
extracurricular activity in the world
working with other human beings is the
reality of the world that these students
are entering and first and foremost
project-based learning is about revising
that no Louise doesn't have a computer
at home and some of the other students
did so of course he's he's at a
disadvantage when it comes time to start
playing with iMovie but whoever was was
at the computer his chin was on their
shoulder you know he was always watching
engaged adding his feedback and it was
appreciated and people really mentioned
at the end that Louise's ideas were a
positive thread through the whole
project and it really boosted Louise's
sense of himself and what he could
contribute his academic identity and his
and his sense of himself as an
intellectual
the students were immediately noticed
that sometimes the Pro and the con
argument in this official state
information guide would have facts that
directly contradicted each other on the
two sides and there was nothing in the
voter information guide that gave the
voter the tools to reconcile that so I
love that the students noticed that
early and realized that they need to go
out into the world and figure out how to
reconcile that that factual
contradiction the main thing that
students need to learn and become
accustomed to just second nature
thinking about is where is this coming
from and it's amazing how the students
live on the Internet
because they're young and often just
don't have a lot of experience with with
this they they don't see the contours
that I think a more sophisticated
critical thinker sees we were living and
breathing media literacy from the the
very first moment we kicked off this
project we looked at an Eisenhower
campaign commercial and we were
analyzing the message to remind the
students that the analytical skills that
you're learning in school don't live in
some vacuum separate from your sort of
daily media rich life I love when
technology is so imbued in the project
itself the technology almost disappears
you know in a way that I think is
authentic oftentimes schools treat
technology as this separate thing and
you do it with your computer teacher and
it happens in the computer lab it's seen
as this separate entity which it's not
how the technologies working in the 21st
century and so I love the fact that
they're expected to kind of figure
things out as they go and that an
English teacher or a government teacher
is is using this in a way and expecting
them to use
nology in a way that that is a means to
an end so I knew this knocking to have
to make this a little bit more
interesting because I think a lot of
people just don't know what it's about
so Sam Johnny take charge of two of
these so often the only way to teach
something is to have a living example of
it there's a certain flexibility I see
in Andrew that that gives him this
ability to to not sort of rub people the
wrong way emotionally but still have an
honest intellectual disagreement his
political views differ from just about
everybody here he's able to not back
down from his his positions he speaks up
but in a way that's always so respectful
that the students listen and forces them
to really think about in defense of
their own positions
one of the major things were working to
build and our students in these projects
is that the teacher is increasingly
invisible to the process we are
depending it on those moments on student
initiative we're depending upon the
students not waiting to be told what to
do next but I'm at but I'm often hoping
students move on to the next stage even
before I get to work with that group
individually so when I sit down with a
group it's not what are you gonna do
next I
I know what's working well when I sit
down and say what have you guys done
it's something that can be taught and if
we just sort of hope that people figure
that out on their own in life we're not
reaching the potential what we can
accomplish in an educational setting it
helps a lot when you've got a diverse
class fortunate to work in a place where
the you know the raw material so to
speak is is rich for cross-cultural
communication and understanding the prop
1a group they really realize that the
collaborative process from the beginning
was going to be something that served
them and didn't hamper them and I would
add to that that the fact that that was
a diverse group of individuals only
accentuated that that possibility so
often when we speak about diversity it's
only skin-deep
there was also I think a rich diversity
of thinking that was important thing
for their success one of the things that
makes teachers nervous about group work
justifiably is what we call the
piggybacking effect students who are
lazier realizing that they can piggyback
on the more motivated or conscientious
students and end up being part of a
high-quality product without having
necessarily done their fair share effort
or I think more importantly not having
done their fair share of learning what's
important for teachers is that they keep
abreast enough of what's happening in
the groups that's why when I when I
circulate the room when I sit down to
talk to a group I can't see that group
as a whole I have to see it for its
parts and get really good at assessing
are there some slackers in here are
there some people that are writing and I
got to intervene when I see that happens
secondly assessment at the end of the
process you can't just give every member
of the group the same grade based on the
final output that is being unfair to
students who didn't work very hard and
students who did so there's different
tricks of the trade you know doing some
reflection process at the end having the
group self self assess at different
points during the project and also just
keeping your your your eyes open in here
your ears open
our 21st century skills we actually call
them our leadership skills because we
believe that all of these things the
critical thinking the creativity the
collaboration that the sum of all these
is that that if you walk out of a high
school being skilled in these habits of
mind these social and intellectual
skills you're gonna end up emerging as
the leader you're gonna you're gonna get
plunked down somewhere and compared to
the people around you that haven't been
coached and trained in these things
you're gonna you're gonna rise and be
the one that people look to to get
everybody organized have a direction set
up the channels of communication prod
the creativity of approach not give up
when things get hard that's what leaders
do
you