The final days are tough. A mixed bag of emotions always accompany the myriad of end-of-year items that must be checked off: submit documentation; book count; bulletin boards; cleaning out of lockers, desks, and cabinets; assessments, grades, ... and the list goes on. It is a whirlwind, and often times, exhausted teachers try their best to maintain engagement and manage curriculum, but have a hard time being successful with either.
This year, we asked our teachers to step out of their comfort zone and complete a Project-Based Learning (PBL) unit ... for the two weeks before the end of school. Were we asking the impossible? Much to my amazement, the teachers took a deep breath and dove in with all they had!
Months earlier, the instructional coaching team was given the daunting task of creating a school-wide PBL centering around a single science concept, and aligned to each grade level's TEKS, and crafted to include developmentally appropriate products for each age group. Our Christie Cub Wildlife Refuge project was born. The next challenge was to get teacher buy in.
We launched the video that presented a challenging real-world problem that needed viable solutions. With a certain amount of fear and trepidation, we watched to see how our project was being received. Would teachers be resentful of this involved task? Would the kids be apathetic? Was it too much? What emerged in the days that followed was truly magical.
With fidelity, the teachers challenged the students to help solve the overpopulation issue that was posed. Students, from Kinder to fifth, stepped up to the task with enthusiasm. Teachers saw how enthusiastically engaged the students were and became caught up in the excitement. Never have I seen teachers and students so enthralled with a project. Each room I walked into was filled with students completely involved in the task at hand. Almost each day, at least one teacher came to me to tell me how much they loved the PBL and how much the kids were learning from the unit. A few days after the launch, I walked into my pod to find a veritable jungle in one teacher's room. She had come up to school on Saturday to hang vines and large, hand-cut leaves on the ceiling of her room. She wanted her kids to experience the environment in which their animals needed to survive. Within days, the entire grade level had followed suit. How many teachers do you know who would decorate their rooms FOUR days before the end of school?!?! Their presentations were outstanding, and the students were bursting with pride as they shared their research and solutions.
While we may not have performed a PBL in the purest sense, the learning and the engagement was undeniable. Each student gained a better understanding of grade-level key knowledge and understandings of life science, had opportunities for sustained inquiry, asserted voice and choice over their project, and presented for authentic audiences. Every teacher in our building experienced the benefits of implementing a PBL and saw the value of inquiry based learning. These are celebrations worth celebrating! What an incredible highlight to finish up a great year!
Pictures pending. Stay tuned!
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