Introduction to Project Based learning

It is not news that too often we hear from pupils that school is boring and that they cannot relate to nor understand the material that is presented to them each day in class.  

Project Based Learning: accommodates different approaches to learning; makes content more meaningful; develops higher-order cognitive skills, life skills, technological skills and self-management skills; Students are excited, engaged, enthusiastic and empowered about their learning dig more deeply into a topic and expand their interests; retain what they learn; make connections between different subject areas and other aspects of their life; gain confidence and improve social and collaborative skills.

Project Based Learning

To those of us who teach and love our subjects, it seems incomprehensible that students are not passionate about them.  Rather than feel disheartened, we need to understand that we have before us both a challenge and an opportunity.  Project-based learning experiences will help us figure out how to make learning come alive for our middle school students.

Imagine what a classroom would look and sound like when students are actively engaged in inquiry work, where they are reading, talking, questioning, analyzing and creating products, in large groups, small groups, independently – toward the goal of demonstrating their learning based on self-selected compelling questions and topics. 

The purpose of project-based learning is to provide a structure through which students can demonstrate mastery of a subject by creating, and presenting, a research-based project that is driven by their own interest in a topic and allows them to work within the same parameters as real researchers.  While the projects can assess the students’ knowledge of content, concepts and skills and the level of depth and complexity to which students have understood them, they also allow students to think deeply and analytically and to question a topic which has particular resonance and meaning for them.  

It therefore should be concluded that this stage of learning in the CCTI course comes to further equip its beneficiaries with yet another skill that will go a long way in making the learning process more streamlined and exciting.