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Project-based Learning
Project-based learning is an instructional pedagogy that integrates academic content, social-emotional learning, and 21st-century skills to engage students in authentic and meaningful projects. Throughout a unit, students actively engage in developing new understanding, cycles of inquiry, and application of learning to develop a product or answer to demonstrate their learning. An important facet of PBL is that the “product” is not at the end of the learning, but rather developed throughout the unit providing the framework and value of the content. Explore more about the difference between PBL and “Doing a Project”.
We strive to make every project-based learning unit a Gold Standard PBL. Gold standard project-based learning units utilize 7 Essential Project Design Elements and 7 Teaching Practices. All projects utilize best instructional practices including: descriptive feedback, formative and summative assessment, differentiated instruction and engagement strategies. PBL units are uniquely driven around sustained inquiry of the driving question that offers students voice and choice to create a high-quality product for a public showcase. High quality PBL have shown positive impacts on student achievement and provided equitable educational opportunities.
Terminology
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Driving Question - An overarching question that guides the project and learning
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Tuning Protocol - A protocol to reflect and gather feedback related to the project
Examples of Project-Based Learning Units at Kennedy
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Kindergarten: Health Sciences
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Students studied the garden, heard from dieticians and cafeteria staff and read books to create a class e-book about health eating habits with examples of each food group to be shared in the Kennedy electronic library catalog.
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First: Economics
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Students worked in pairs to complete a design template and create a logo in Keynote from the Everyone. In STEAM class, student groups designed and made a variety of slime to be sold during spring parent-teacher conferences. Students celebrated with a local face painting business.
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Second: States of Matter and Changes
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Students explore states of matter through assembling and disassembling materials. In STEAM, students upcycle crayons, work with recyclables and develop a product to be sold at the Omaha Children’s Business Fair.
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Third: Literacy and Civics
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Students selected favorite books to create a short book talk using Keynote and Clips about to be shared on the Kennedy student news. Using Microsoft forms, students collected votes for the winner in each bracket to have a fiction and nonfiction champion.
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Fourth/ Fifth: Life Science and Persuasive Writing
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Students will research ecosystems in our community to create an individual model of a local ecosystem to include in a persuasive essay about why this ecosystem is important to our community. In groups, students will create an artifact (PSA, poster, etc.) about how to protect their chosen ecosystem to be shared or posted in the community.
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