Project-based Learning for Innovation (Deeper Learning)

Project-Based Learning Leads to Innovation

By Anthony Jackson on April 23, 2013 4:20 AM

The number one question I am asked is what teaching for the global innovation age looks like. My colleague Lisa Tyrrell offers a glimpse at promising practices.

By Lisa Tyrrell

At the recent Deeper Learning Conference at High Tech High in San Diego, keynote speakerDr. Tony Wagner spoke about the importance of preparing students for the innovation economy. He knows a thing or two about this: Wagner is the first Innovation Education Fellow at the Technology & Entrepreneurship Center at Harvard University and author of Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People Who Will Change the World.

Many of the young, successful entrepreneurs that Wagner interviewed for his book noted that it was their project-based learning experiences that prepared them to be successful in the global innovation economy.

How are schools working to encourage the next generation of innovators? By developing unique, project-based learning opportunities that foster students' passion and creativity, teachers are promoting innovation and Deeper Learning. Deeper learning experiences help students master core academic content, think critically, solve complex problems, work collaboratively, communicate effectively, and engage in self-directed learning.

For example, consider Brian Bailey, English teacher at the Ambassador School of Global Leadership in Los Angeles, California. Brian allows students "Innovation" time each Friday in order to investigate their personal passions. This practice is modeled after Google's twenty-percent time—where employees can spend 20% of work time on anything they want, with the belief that free thinking and tinkering leads to innovation. One student is learning to program a computer to respond to voice commands. Another student is attempting to develop a substance that will keep gum from sticking to tables. Other students are sponsoring children from other countries, working on a water purification system for salt-water, and trying to patent a product that will remove stains from suede. A small group of students are collaboratively reviewing the work of The National Research Council Committee to assess fuel economy technologies for medium- and heavy-duty vehicles. This group is then working together to investigate ideas for greater fuel efficiency. Through self-directed learning, all these students are learning core academic content while thinking critically and solving complex problems.

Another good example comes from The Denver Center for International Studies (DCIS), where upperclassmen are afforded the opportunity to explore their personal passions through a program called Passages. This multi-year, project-based course allows students to engage in self-directed learning based on their individual interests in global issues. Students collaborate with faculty and community mentors to research a self-selected topic. Sample projects include: investigating the benefits and innovations that were a result of NASA spending; researching brain plasticity theories and treatments for Alzheimer's, stroke, and phantom limbs; exploring renewable energy and testing different types of bio-diesel; developing a mentoring program for DCIS between High School and Middle School students; collecting medical supplies for Project Cure and working in a village in the Dominican Republic; organizing a trip to Thailand to work at an elephant rescue camp; service learning trip to two Haitian villages in the Dominican Republic; and facilitating student exchanges with other international studies schools and the developing a website for ongoing communication between students. Each spring, seniors exhibit their learning to the DCIS community and their committee. These projects engage the students in each of the tenets of Deeper Learning.

These are just two of several examples of the innovative teaching and deeper learning occurring schools. Both schools are part of the Asia Society International Studies Schools Network, which is part of The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation's Deeper Learning Community of Practice.

School Leadership Summit - Tomorrow LIVE! (Steve Hargadon - Talks will be archived)

. Thursday, March 28th, is our inaugural, online, and free School Leadership Summit. http://www.SchoolLeadershipSummit.com. We invite you to join us for a very full day of sessions from Yong Zhao, Michael Fullan, Bill Brennan, and 67 other presenters as part of a virtual and collaborative global conversation on school leadership. The hour-by-hour conference schedule, with instructions for attending, is available to view in 35 different time zones at http://admin20.org/page/schedule. The Summit welcome is at 6:30am US Pacific Daylight Time, and the conference finishes with an informal online "after party" at 7:00pm, twelve and a half hours later. Conference strands are aligned to the internationally-recognized ISTE National Education Technology Standards for Administrators and include the leadership topics of: Vision in a Changing World, Teaching and Learning in a Changing World, Professional Learning in a Changing World, Data-driven Reform in a Changing World, and Ethical and Responsible Use in a Changing World.  TICAL (the Technology Information Center for Administrative Leadership) is the founding partner of the conference. We invite you to join us! All are welcome. See you online! Steve Steve Hargadon Co-Chair, 2013 School Leadership Summit http://www.stevehargadon.com Visit Classroom 2.0 at: http://www.classroom20.com/?xg_source=msg_mes_network Recordings: Session recordings will be posted almost immediately after a session is completed. Look to the conference menu for a link to the recordings page. To continue correspondence with a session presenter and attendees, look for the presentation discussion post here.

Student Driven Design - Personalized Learning (Submitted by Jim Ross)

If students designed their own school… it would look like this

Posted by Valerie Strauss on February 20, 2013 at 4:00 am

Student Peter Boyce
(By Charles Tsai)

“It’s crazy that in a system that is meant to teach and help the youth there is no voice from the youth at all.” That’s the opening line in a video called “If students designed their own schools,” about The Independent Project, a high school semester designed and implemented entirely by students.

What did it look like? No quizzes. No tests. No grades. Students created their own learning materials and taught themselves and each other.

The Independent Project started in 2011 at Monument Mountain Regional High School, a public school in Massachusetts, after a student named Sam Levin advanced an idea about students creating their own learning environment in order to find the engagement and mastery he felt were lacking in many teacher-designed classes. Principal Marianne Young agreed to a pilot.

In this model, teachers serve as mentors and coaches, not as direct instructors, while students pose questions and find ways to answer them.

The pilot semester — in which eight students participated (one 10th grader, five 11th graders and two seniors) — was broken down into four parts: orientation, the sciences, the arts, and the collective endeavor, which all of the students would agree on a serious world issue and work together to find a solution or a piece of a solution. Students would come up with their own questions in each subject, research it and then teach it to the other students.

After the first semester, an evaluation was undertaken and changes were made to the model. Now several schools in the country have their own Independent Project.

The video was done by Charles Tsai, director of Learning Networks for Ashoka Canada, a global association of social entrepreneurs. He also  works in the area of self-directed education through his organization, Social Creatives.

Here’s Tsai’s video: