Student Perspectives: A Comprehensive Reflection on Project-Based Learning

 

“This was probably my favorite project that I've ever done in an English class because it is based on a topic that I am a big fan of -- video games. I've never done something that I've been extremely interested in during English class.” - Hunter

“This project involved video games, art, symbolism, gothic literature, and design -- all things that I love.” - Traci

“I am proud of the different ways I was able to better the project because of the effort I gave. This was an amazing idea to get us to engage and learn about gothic themes and symbolisms.” - Caitlyn 

Statements like these are sure to put a smile on any teacher’s face because, naturally, teachers want their students to enjoy learning. They want students to be engaged and excited about their work. But not all learning experiences result in the kind of enthusiasm these students expressed in their project reflections.

So, what was different about this assignment?

The Project

Students in the STEM Academy at Northwest High School completed a “Gothic Video Games PBL”. They were assigned a small team (3-4 people) and tasked with creating a video game design that honored Edgar Allen Poe’s contributions to Gothic Literature. By the end of their project, they had to answer the driving question, “How does style drive creativity?” Their learning tasks included:

• work as a team to develop an E10+, ‘gothic game’ idea loosely based on an existing Gothic short story 
• create a visual representation of their game to support the pitch
• 'pitch' their idea to a local game developer through a formal presentation

The end-products themselves aren’t that unique, so what made this project so engaging? In PBL students follow a learning path wherein creation acts as the impetus for learning.

Project-based learning reframes traditional teaching, offering real-world, hands-on experience. In PBL students are challenged to create an authentic end-product, but haven’t necessarily learned what they need to know to create that end-product. In this way, student inquiry drives learning in a PBL.

Students know they have to create or do something (and even have a product rubric), but they don’t always know how to accomplish their task or have the knowledge they need to get it done. Students gain those throughout the PBL and apply what they learn as they create. This is different from classrooms where demonstrating mastery primarily happens at the end of a unit.

Paired with consistent feedback, PBL leaves room for students to fail in the moment but still grow and succeed in the end. The need to create becomes a catalyst to learning, and within the parameters of the PBL, a student can personalize their learning experience based on their interests and passions. How and what students learn in a PBL is organically driven by their authentic "need to know" for the purpose of creating.

(A note for teachers: In PBL, student inquiry is strategically planned and guided. The success of projects like these hinge on detailed backward design and the facilitator’s intentional guidance and scaffolding of student thinking throughout the project.)

The Reflection

Through Project-Based Learning, students get more than just academic content. In PBL students practice critical skills like communication, personal responsibility, time management, teamwork, and creativity. Student reflections even showed that through PBL students apply what they learn across content areas and make cross-curricular and industry connections.

"[Through this project] I grew my knowledge of game design and gothic elements, which allowed me to become more creative with those things. In a STEM field, most of the problems you have to solve aren't going to have definitive answers, so you need to be creative and innovative to solve them." - Robert

“A creative skill that I grew during this project has to be brainstorming. I don't brainstorm often… but this project and the brainstorming [needed] allowed me to think of a lot of unique ideas we could add to our game.” - Rylan

“Creativity is extremely important in the STEM field as it requires everyone to be unique when it comes to approaching a problem. If we all share the same idea, the final product will be dull.” - Anthony

"Our group's problem-solving was phenomenal. We found many issues with our original idea, but then made an amazing comeback and [designed] a whole new game and presentation. My group was lacking in the communication department... Thankfully, we pulled ourselves back together to make what I would say is a pretty good project." - Ethan

Of course, no collaborative effort is without its challenges. Students shared that, by working together, they learned to advocate for themselves and each other. They learned to lead, to compromise, to play on each other’s strengths, and to communicate with one another in a professional manner. Ultimately, they learned with and from each other.

“We came across many problems while working on our project. There were many things that we either disagreed with or didn't fully understand. We had to collaborate and try to work things out.” - Ryan

“I've grown as a problem-solver by understanding my weaknesses and getting help from people who are better at a particular thing than I am.” - Amelia

“This project taught me a lot of presentation skills that I will need in the future... After watching many [other teams present], I was able to learn the best ways to talk, communicate, and demonstrate ideas when presenting. That is why I enjoyed this project so much. I was able to learn some really great ways on how I should go about presenting.” - Vincent

“We were able to blend our ideas as a team to make something really cool.” - Anthony 

The Products

After two and a half weeks of hard work, students were proud of themselves and of what they had created. They were eager to celebrate and share their hard work, growth, and successes. They presented their ideas to a panel of judges, which included a gaming expert who was acting as their game developer. Celebrate these hardworking students by exploring are some of their final products:

“The Crypt”

This team of STEM students designed a full website, complete with original artwork, to showcase their video game idea based off of the story “The Fall of the House of Usher”. Highlighting the idea that our surroundings have an impact on our mental health, they challenged players to escape from the Crypt before they "go insane". Replete with gothic imagery and symbolism, in this game, players are “in a fight against insanity, which is caused by the dark”. The player “must cling to torches and light sources to save what sanity remains”.

"Puppet's Mirror"

This group designed a game where you escape by solving puzzles. They cleverly embedded mini-games that innocently represented the darker aspects of their short story, "The Black Cat" in order to adhere to their E10+ kid-friendly rating for their game. For instance, when in the story the cat loses an eye to the owner's violence, in the game, players are instead transported to "a rigged rotating cup" game with images of a one-eyed cat. They even used online tools to create an AI vision board for their game. They also created 3D mockups of their main character, noting minor adjustments in her appearance to symbolize her personality changing and other gothic aspects of their game. 

"Just Around The Corner"

In this "labyrinth escape game", players must get out "before the consequences of their actions catch up with them". In this excellent presentation, students shared original artwork, that included iconic gothic symbolism from Edgar Allen Poe's "The Black Cat". Their work helped the project judges visualize each level. They also included a detailed description of how sensory elements of gameplay and user experience would communication the theme, build suspense, and contribute to the overall gothic of the game. Lastly, their pitch used persuasive diction to entice future players. 

Thinking about trying a PBL with your students? Check out these helpful resources from PBLWorks. 

How to Turn 6th Graders Into World Travelers

At Gene Pike Middle School, 6th grade World Cultures teachers Connie Garza and Dawn Goldstein want to do more than teach their students about other places -- they want to show their students the world. Consider for a moment that 2018 research discovered 1 in 10 Americans has never left their home state, for financial or other reasons. With this in mind, it's safe to assume not all of our students will have the opportunity to visit many of the far-off places they're learning about in school.

Still, we know that learning to understand other cultures and gaining perspective on how other people live is an important part of succeeding in our global society and in learning to be a well-rounded individual. Thanks to Google’s Virtual Reality (VR) Tour Builder, even if Garza and Goldstein can't fly their students abroad, they can still take them to places all over the world.

For context, Google’s Virtual Reality platform relies on Google Earth’s existing 360-degree footage, making it possible to virtually explore any place in the world through your computer screen or a pair of VR Goggles. What’s even better? Their VR Tour Creator allows people (in this case 6th graders) to design a virtual tour with stops anywhere around the globe and lets them embed their own photos or written details into the tour.

After explaining their task to students, Goldstein and Garza used student-led stations to guide their learning about Europe. During their stations, students used hyper docs and other printed and digital resources to learn about European countries overall, documenting what they learned in their “travel journals” and earning stamps in their “passports” for visiting each country. Throughout this step, students gained important insight into the countries and cultures that would ultimately help them build their tour during work-time.

A key success in this project is that by launching the project before introducing and researching the countries, Garza and Goldstein prolonged their students’ inquiry and created a crucial “need to know”. Instead of learning for the sake of learning (albeit a worthy endeavor), these students were learning with the motivation to design their dream tour through a European country, that would also highlight important geographical and cultural details of each place they visit. This created a personalized passion for their learning that inherently increased student engagement throughout the learning process of every country.

A major challenge in a project like this -- where students are focusing on only one from a list of topics they need to be experts on -- is making sure students master their overall learning about European culture and geography, while still highlighting the country they are most interested in learning more about. To address this, Garza and Goldstein made sure students visited each country through the exploratory stations, but they also gave students a peer audience. Because students would be sharing their projects with each other, they were motivated to do their best work; meanwhile, students were exposed to numerous European countries through their peers' student-created virtual tours.

One thing to remember is that you don’t need VR goggles to make Google’s Tour Builder interactive and exciting. Anyone can explore the tours online, and students can use the “hotspot” feature. For this project, they were asked to add detailed pictures, important travel notes, and fun facts about the culture and geography to make their tours more interactive. For example, one student used a hotspot near Italy’s Leaning Tower of Pisa to clarify that a modest dress code is an important consideration when visiting Italian landmarks. Ultimately, creating tours through Tour Builder is easy, but this "hotspot" feature lets students add reflective depth and learning to their creation. It is a feature that educators can rely on to make the task of creating more rigorous. You can see a student-created tour of Italy here: Example.

Through this project, Garza and Goldstein undoubtedly created a few travel-bugs, but even more, they gave students the opportunity to imagine themselves going on great adventures. They gave this group of sixth graders the chance to be (virtual) world-travelers.

The Real World is In Your Classroom

Visualize a small group of kids huddled in a middle school flex space, Expo marker in hand and video camera staged in front of them, confidently drawing shapes and lines on the whiteboard as they explain the steps to solve an equation. Picture students, who otherwise avoid math, passionately debating the best place to ask a question: is it before or after an example? Can you hear them, animated, discussing the best way to teach someone about complementary and supplementary angles?

This was the scene in Jennifer White’s math class at Pike Middle School when she challenged her students to create Edpuzzles that teach other students new math concepts. Determined to engage her students in rigorous and authentic learning, she asked them to design video lessons that would be used as warm-ups and tutorials in other classes.


If you don’t know, EdPuzzle is a video platform that lets teachers turn any video into a lesson by embedding questions, comments, and/or audio. Teachers then assign their video lessons to students and collect formative data, like who watched the video and what they understood. Because the videos are self-paced, students can re-watch them as many times as they need, and even share them with others.

For this project, in teams of 2-3, students chose a topic from their next unit of study. Before creating their video lessons in EdPuzzle, they explored resources, researched their topics, and planned what comments and questions would best help their audience learn the concepts.

White gave students a choice to either find an existing video or create their own to use in the EdPuzzle. Some were excited to make their own videos using their Chromebooks. Giving choice helped her differentiate for students who needed more time during the ‘discovery phase’ and for those who needed an extra challenge.

Before publishing and sharing their work with their audience, students gave each other feedback (using Google Forms) about how they could improve their lessons. Mrs. White gave students time to apply the feedback they collected. This step also worked to expose students to all of the terms they needed to know, and to reinforce the concepts they would eventually see in class.

In the end, this whole project took 3-4 days, provided a whole department with student-created peer tutorial resources, and gave students the chance to learn with a purpose. You can see examples of student work here: Example 1 & Example 2

It is hard to imagine what authentic learning looks like in practice because there isn’t a ‘single right way’ to approach it. John Lamar, with bie.org, put it simply, “In fully authentic work, students are doing work that is real to them... [it has] a direct impact on or use in the real world. (The “real world,” by the way, could still be school, which is a very real place for students.)”

It’s easy to get caught up in preparing kids for the future, but don’t forget: to our students, the real world is here and now. The real world is in your classroom as much as it is outside of it.

One of Mrs. White's biggest takeaways from this project was that students owned their learning throughout the entire process. That happened because she gave students a purpose and audience for their learning. Students were proud to contribute to their immediate environment and motivated knowing that other people would see and benefit from their work.

Ultimately, when educators design authentic learning opportunities they empower students in the present. Instead of hoping students will become leaders, creators, and good citizens one day, teachers can give students the chance to be those people today, to contribute to their real world in the here and now.

"IT'S ALIVE!" Bringing Critical Thought to Life with Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

Victor was a learner. He had a passion for acquiring new information and using it to innovate and create. In Mary Shelley’s famous novel, Frankenstein, the title character, Victor Frankenstein, stated that “It was the secrets of heaven and earth that I desired to learn...” In the story, Victor exposed an unchecked curiosity for learning as well as his own tragic flaw. Although learning is generally a positive process, understanding how acquisition of valuable information goes together with personal and societal ethics is something that a learner must fully grasp when encountering content, if they intend to apply it successfully. Through critical thinking and discourse, fostered by student choice and individualized learning opportunities, students are able to think differently about a text and draw conclusions about its relevance to their current world.

The type of critical thinking required to comprehend and analyze encountered information and its connection to real life areas of advancement is an absolute necessity that ninth grade ELA students experience as they encounter Shelley’s text in Pre-AP/GT English courses at Eaton High School. These students explore, consider, and discuss the “moral liability” of “knowledge” and “progress” as a part of a problem based learning opportunity that allows for student choice while also facilitating real world connections to the text. As part of this project, students in ninth grade Pre-AP/GT English are presented with the driving question of “Does knowledge or progress ever become a moral liability?” They are asked to utilize resources and processes of their choosing to explore both sides of an area of advancement and then choose varied platforms and tools in which to communicate their findings in ways that answer that driving question. The findings are curated into a “Live Binder” that is shared with peers and other school and community members.

Students are given a wide variety of options for how to present up to date research in ways that not only answer the given problem but also present both sides or an issue and advocate for a perspective that has been developed through meticulous research and and discussion. Some students choose to use WeVideo or YouTube to help create and edit videos in the format of interviews or commercials, while others use similar tools to create podcasts or radio shows. Some prefer approaching their topics through graphic design with visual advertisements in Canva, or written argument in journal or blog entries using Blogger or Smore. Whatever the platform, a truly beneficial part of this experience comes in when a student is given the freedom to choose a tool or resource that they are confident in using and that communicates their voice effectively while helping to share their knowledge with the community around them.

As students develop argumentation, research, and independent communication skills throughout this project, they are able to display those over the course of a week set aside for formally sharing findings with the school community. While presenting their inventive and relevant creations, these students confidently defend their research and conclusions in a dissertation style setting, which is not only challenging but truly impressive to witness. It is in a forum such as this where it becomes apparent that our students are not only being given the freedom to explore content and required texts but they are also being provided opportunities to develop their own viewpoints on critical societal issues while shaping an ethical compass of their own, all while being able to connect it to their reading.

Victor Frankenstein also said, “I will pioneer a new way, explore unknown powers, and unfold to the world the deepest mysteries of creation.” However, what Victor was lacking was a true understanding of what to do with that information, which students in our freshman Pre-AP/GT English classes are acquiring and applying through research into their own opinions, in-depth analysis, and critical discourse. These invaluable learning experiences are things that will help to not only develop lifelong learners but also facilitate learning that encourages an approach to new discoveries with a critical eye and solid ethical grounding.

Say “Oui!” to Performance-based Assessments

If you’re anything like I was as a classroom teacher, you’ve spent many nights drowning in papers to grade. You understand the time spent in coffee shops, trying desperately to get caught up. And yet, if you’re anything like me, there have been times that, after all those hours and lattes, you weren’t satisfied that your students’ grades actually reflected their knowledge and ability. Where was I going wrong?

I assigned and graded vocabulary worksheets each week, but students were still scoring low on their diction in writing. I graded reading quizzes that assessed plot and character knowledge, but in the end some students couldn’t talk about the major themes of a novel. Between what felt like wasted class time and weekends spent grading, it never failed that when it turned out an assignment didn't actually tell me whether or not my students truly “got it”, I was left frustrated.

I understood that traditional assignments and tests work to show if students “know” something, but quickly learned that they fall short as an indicator of whether or not students can actually use that knowledge. Of course there is a time and place for each, but it is important for teachers to challenge their students with performance-based assessments if they want to know that students can apply their knowledge in meaningful ways. Northwest High School’s French teacher, Madame Blanc (Mrs. White), made this shift in her classroom this year, away from traditional tests and towards a performance-based method of assessment -- and it seems to be paying off.

Each six weeks, Madame Blanc gives her students both creative tasks and opportunities to apply and demonstrate their learning through student-created products that are ultimately shared through their ePortfolio, a personal and digital collection of their growth and learning. As a basic example, she asked her students to create an article for a French magazine that explains an American holiday and custom as a way to assess their application of many language skills they are working on.

French student Elise Reuman recounted one assignment where she and her classmates were asked to create a video that described their partner’s family as a way to demonstrate their ability to use adjectives in French. Using Adobe Spark video, she described her classmate's family. Elise reflected, “...using the vocabulary in a way that applied it to a likely scenario really helped to ingrain the information. Projects like this usually only require the [written] portion of the vocabulary… [but] Mrs.White, went a step further and required a vocal response as well. This really solidified some of the pronunciation and helped me become more comfortable with actually speaking the French language.”

As Elise shared, performance-based tasks engage students in more authentic opportunities to practice real-world skills. It’s important to note that, in a performance-based classroom “teachers do not have to “give up” units of study or favorite activities” (ASCD). According to ASCD, it’s because these “authentic tasks are rooted in curriculum” that “teachers can develop [assignments] based on what already works for them.” It’s ultimately through small changes in how teachers ask students to learn that “assignments become more authentic and more meaningful to students.”

For example, in another assignment in Madame Blanc's class, students were challenged to learn about multiple perspectives, including the likes and dislikes of French teenagers. They had to go further to compare/contrast these perspectives with those of American Teens. Students interviewed their peers (some opting to collect data through Google Forms), graphed and visualized the data they collected (through Google Sheets), and then wrote of summary of their findings in both French and English, finally sharing their work through their ePortfolio (a website created on Google Sites). Assignments like this require students to be strong in their content knowledge, but more than that, they develop skills outside of French language studies -- skills like the 6 Cs: creativity, communication, collaboration, critical thinking, character education, and citizenship.

Watching performance-based assessments work for Madame Blanc has reiterated what hindsight and experience taught me: It was when I focused on creating rigorous and authentic learning tasks for my students, rather than assigning simple checks-for-understanding for grades, that I best served them. It is through rigorous, performance-based learning tasks that we can empower our students to think critically and create, and that we can most accurately and authentically assess their learning.

Spark Learning: Inquiry-Based Learning in 5th Grade

If you could be any creature at all, what would you be? Which ink spreads the least in water? Can a flashlight be powered by the sun? Can water be purified through evaporation?

These were only a few of the questions that 5th grade scientists at Prairie View Elementary school answered through their own research and the scientific process. Their teachers, Mrs. Davidson and Mrs. Ward, challenged them with an Inquiry Project; Mrs. Davidson explained, “They created their own questions based off of personal interests, and followed through with gathering data, analyzing their data, and creating a presentation to show their results.”


Mrs. Davidson added, “We wanted them to learn to question something on their own”. They challenged students to think about how they approach a problem, and even how they would handle social situations, how people would handle money or respond to various circumstances. But most of all, they gave students choice. For their inquiry project, students could choose any topic that sparked inquiry: they could investigate something entirely new or ask a question that extended previous inquiries from their time in school. One of her students, Kaden shared, “I like that [the inquiry project is] a creative activity”, and that after this project, he “knows how to answer [his] questions”.


Following the steps of the scientific process through inquiry-based learning, students developed questions and hypotheses before performing research. Zephyr’s team was interested in conducting a social experiment. They wanted to know, given a few staple options, what food people would eat for the rest of their lives if that had to. He said, “We made a survey and asked the staff and 5th, 4th, and 3rd graders. We collected the data and looked at the pie chart… Surprisingly, most people prefer pizza.” Zephyr added, “It’s important to answer questions because we can learn”.


Both Mrs. Ward and Mrs. Davidson, co-teachers in math and science, highlighted how integral both math and science were to the processes students were tasked with completing. Mrs. Ward clarified, “You can’t do science without math, they’re married”. Student Davis made cross-curricular connections through this project, explaining that what he learned can be applied in other areas of his life. He made the connection talking about math and problems in general, “...first [I] look at the problem and then think about it. Then, get a solution. It’s the same as science.”


Ultimately, inquiry projects like this one offer students choice, but not at the expense of content knowledge or the skills students are developing through their own hard work. For example, one team learned the steps of the design process as a part of their inquiry. They wondered, “Can you clean water through evaporation?” To find the best way to measure their results, students had to design an evaporation system that would test their theory. They collaborated to created two different designs, tested each design to see which worked better, and tested their original hypothesis. Other group's experiments failed, but Mrs. Davidson stressed to them that failure is a part of learning and of the scientific process - failure is an opportunity, so they would present about what they learned through their failures.

A crucial aspect of this assignment was that students’ inquiry was driven by the end-goal of presenting their scientific findings to their peers and an audience. As students prepared to present, they had choice in how to showcase their findings. They created videos, posters, and traditional slideshows chalked full of tables and graphs; this autonomy and choice helped to foster their passion to share what they had learned. Students were even given the opportunity to present to an authentic audience at EXPO, the district’s student showcase. Student Davis excitedly shared that his team’s project was picked to present at EXPO, saying, “I did it last year and really liked it. I like getting up there and presenting.” His team made a video "...because it captured what the person was actually saying" Although he thought the video gave them more accurate data, he was quick to reflect on what he would change to improve his presentation before the event, explaining, "We are going to add subtitles".


Mrs. Davidson acknowledges that managing and guiding so many student-groups at a time can be challenging. A project like this requires teachers to step out of any traditional role, and into the role of facilitator. They have to be the supporter, to ask guiding questions, manage supplies, point students to resources for help, and all the while handling classroom management. To be successful, she explained that she gave her students a step-by-step checklist and detailed calendar of due dates and expectations at the start of the project. Mrs. Davidson -- a self-identified control freak -- points out that it's important to let go and let them do it. “Because it’s their own exploration, it’s high interest and high energy,” she stressed, “It’s worth the mess.”

From Consumers to Creators: Students Design Curriculum

Tired of the traditional two-week review of safety rules each year, Ms. Hendrix at Northwest High School decided to put students in the driver's seat of their learning. Her chemistry students were tasked with creating an online, self-paced "Science Safety Education" course that caters to high school students and includes videos, presentations, and assessments. Student Alexis noted they were basically designing curriculum.

One of my favorite aspects of this project is the student ownership of their work. Hector said that his time spent in this project felt productive because he knew it was going to be put to use. Students were creating, all while knowing that there would be a specific audience. This project enabled student choice while staying within the teacher's required parameters and TEKS. Giving up control of an assignment can be scary for teachers, but the ownership and genuine learning that takes place as a result is invaluable to students. Hector added, “It’s cool because [what we created is] actually going to help someone later.”

Students were ultimately able to redefine their learning using video editing software (WeVideo, iMovie App, and Adobe Spark), Google Drive and Slides, and various Moodle features to collaboratively teach future classmates.

Essentially, each team of students was responsible for a different Lab safety and procedure topic. There were many topics to be covered like journaling, recording scientific data, creating charts and graphs, and the history of science. Each team had to create a note-taking presentation resource, a video, and various assessments for their unit. The teams collaborated to culminate everything in a final product for the next year’s science students to use at the beginning of the school year.

Ms. Hendrix was sure to leave the actual creation of the course to the students, but did help them format it into Moodle so others could benefit from their hard work. Payton said, “[This project] made me reflect on how I learned as a sophomore, and I was able to apply that for other students.” In creating the course, students had to think critically about how people learn, what type of learning sticks, and what resources and content would be best for their intended audience. Everett added, “...we had multiple people who learned different ways in our group, and so each person was able to contribute differently.”

The teams pulled from existing resources and created brand new ones. Many students embedded student-made videos into their Google Slide presentations. Alexis’s team worked hard to make their video entertaining. “We wanted it to be funny because ours was … about doing a write-up,” Alexis noted. “It’s a boring topic for some, so we wanted it to be funny considering our audience [was] teenagers.” As always, some of the biggest learning moments came as students reflected on their work. Hector reminisced, “Out of all of the things that I did that year, I feel like this had the biggest impact.”

Frankenstein Project Based Learning: It's ALIVE!

Students in Mrs. Day's English I GT class recently completed work on an amazing project based lesson over Mary Shelley's classic novel, Frankenstein.  According to the project instructions, students were tasked with creating a portfolio of artifacts that answered the driving question: Does knowledge or progress ever become a moral liability? Student groups chose their own area of scientific advancement to research, then explored the driving question from different perspectives and considered both the positive and negative effects of advancement. Based on their subject they created four products of their choosing to represent their findings and related them to the themes found in Frankenstein and how they apply to the world today.

The group of Michael, Matthew, Marcos, and Jonathan chose to do their project on robots and the future of artificial intelligence. "This project was fun because we got to put our own spin on it, both by choosing our own products and in how we did the presentation, which we did as a skit," said Michael. Jonathan elaborated that they "appreciated the product list Mrs. Day gave us because we got to choose what digital tools to use in order to more efficiently represent our topic." This way, students not only got to choose the topic themselves, but they also chose what tools to use. This allowed them to represent their thoughts on the subjects they chose as they related them to the lessons in the book. Michael explained that their research gave them a different "perspective on whether people should do things rather than if they could do things."

The group started by using a Google Doc to plan out the project, including their subject, research, pros/cons of the subject, links to resources and products, and even a script for their presentation. They decided to use a Google Slides presentation to present their portfolio of artifacts, which can be seen here:

The group used multiple tools to create their products.  For example, Matthew used Lucidpress to create their preparing for a Robot Uprising pamphlet "because it had lots of built-in design options for making pamphlets."  They used Imgur to create a Wanted poster for a rogue robot.  Marcos said the ability to choose their own tools, like Canva, and create their own products was very helpful.  He explained that it "gave us ideas how to connect things back to the book.  I chose the Survivor Shopping List because I thought that people would need to know what they'd need to survive, similar to what Frankenstein needed."

Check out the presentation above to see all the products as they were presented, which was in the form of an interactive skit.  The ability of these students to choose their route of learning was evident in every step of this project, and is represented in the quality of their products.  "I love the way these students draw comparisons between a novel from 1818 and modern day technology," said Mrs. Day. "These students prove that literature and the lessons it teaches are always relevant."

Student Profiling for STEM Success

Students at the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) Academy at Northwest High School started this school year with a project where their goal was to further define what it is to be a STEM student.  The project, Profile of a STEM Student, utilized NISD's own Profile of a Graduate as a starting point, but then elaborated and transformed the profile to their own definition for STEM students.  According to Jayden, a student in Mrs. Garrett's engineering class, "the NISD Profile of a Graduate was too broad for us, so this project helped us design one for STEM that was more specific to what we need to learn for college and our careers."

Project Notebooks

The project consisted of multiple parts: gathering information, generating categories for the profile, building their profile, designing a presentation, and giving the presentation in class.  "We documented every step of the process in our Project Notebooks," said Jayden, "including brainstorming, our presentation notes, and our categories that we designed for the profile."


The greatest part of the project was the opportunity for students to choose their own categories that they thought best exemplified the profile of a STEM student.  While some categories were required by the project instructions (core beliefs, mission, college and career readiness), the students got to choose three of their own, such as work-ethic, relationships, responsibilities, or anything else they thought was most important for them.  Chris and Matt, two students from the same group, explained to me some of their group's choices.  "STEM Academy classes use lots of Project Based Learning, so we chose what we thought was best for that."  For example, "we chose work-ethic as one of our categories because time management and working as a team on a project is important for getting things done, just like in a job."

Mrs. Garrett's class

After assembling their profiles, the groups presented their work to the class.  They also got to choose their presentation medium, as long as it was an online presentation.  Most groups chose to use Google Slides for their presentation.  "It's just easier to use and access," said Mark.  "Collaboration was important, and Slides allowed us to all work on the presentation at the same time."  All the presentations were judged by student peers, with senior students judging freshman projects, in order to give constructive feedback on their first ever STEM presentations.

For students, choice is important.  This project gave them a choice, not only in the project itself, but in creating the ideal profile for the rest of their school career as a STEM student.  Check out the links below to see the project instructions, the grading rubric, and some examples of the visual portion of the student presentations.

• Project Instructions
• Project Grading Rubric
• Presentation Example 1
• Presentation Example 2

Lone Star Road Trip

What's better than a family road trip? I know... a road trip planned by the kids!!

Given their newfound knowledge of Texas History, fourth grade students in Mrs. Kerry's class, at Peterson Elementary, dug deep into their Texas roots as they worked in groups to plan a road trip around the Lone Star State. With a set budget and the challenge of finding something to do within each of the four regions of Texas, students got straight to work. Students researched hotels, activities to do within their selected cities and places to eat. Groups also had to keep mileage in mind as they figured out how much gas they would need to take their trip.

Talk about real world application! Students were given a $2,500 budget that would fund

their gas, food, lodging, activities and more. Careful planning was necessary as the group made decisions on how to best spend their money. Emma said, "Some skills I think I gained for the future are that I'll be able to calculate the cost of taking a road trip. By calculating the cost I will be able to figure out what I'm going to eat and do and where I am able to stay".   

As students spent time reflecting on their work, Lindsay commented, "My favorite part of the project was the itinerary because you can plan all the times and exactly how long you want to stay at something." Choosing the destinations they would visit in each region took a lot of research and thought. They were tasked with finding information about that region's industries, climate, plant/animal life, and historical facts.  

Students wrapped up their project with a digital presentation and persuasive letter for their parents. Their letters included three reasons why their parents should agree to take them on this road trip, while their digital presentations highlighted details from each region of Texas they would be visiting.To pull the entire project together, students learned the art of "App Smashing", while utilizing Pic Collage, 30 Hands, and Weebly. By using Weebly to culminate their project, students were able to reach a larger, more global audience as they shared their learning with family and friends.

To view the road trip two groups of fourth graders organized, click the images within this post. Their Weebly sites are private, but can be accessed with a password (mrskerry).

JJ Tech - Wearable Technology

5th grade students at Granger Elementary were given the unique task of  coming up with a wearable technology.  As they were introduced to the project, students realized that outdated clothing tended to be bulky, while more technologically advanced clothing was fragile. "Our job was to merge the two and to make the most suitable clothing," states Justin.  The final product was a website that informs the public of the possibilities of creative technology.  

Josh and Justin not only came up with a clever design, but they also designed a brand and crafted a website that would appeal to the public.  Josh and Justin "JJ Tech" were a dynamic duo.  "I really enjoyed the research," said Justin. "We got to look at different technology and completly choose how our product would turn out.  There are many decisions to make when deciding how to put together clothing." Josh explained, "I liked creating the actual design of both the clothing and the website.  Our design was interesting, so it was fun to explain how it would work."  

Justin explained, "We made a paracord jacket, sandwiched between two layers of polyester.  We chose this option because the paracord is strong."  The team added an innvovative twist to their clothing with detachable solar panels and truly tied their research into their design.  "We wanted to use alternative energy fuels because had just learned about alternative energy and how they affect our environment in class," summed up Justin.  

Josh and Justin were already familiar with Google Sites because they used this platform to create their e-Portfolio.  During this project, they realized that Google Sites was not just for creating e-Portfolios.  Justin points out, "I enjoyed using Google sites because it looks very professional.  Google Sites was a blank slate and let us choose our own colors, insert pictures, and include the research in a way that made sense.  Google sites also allowed us to share the site and work on it together even outside of school."

The one wish that the boys had after the project was completed, was to see who would actually buy their clothing.  Justin and Josh learned how to create a Google Form and embed it in to their website.  The site was then shared on social media and they were able to gather responses from students and classes around the district.

Click Here to Provide Feebdack for Military Man Design

Click Here to Provide Feedback for Urban Man Design

Force and Motion Ninja Style

Check out How to Ninja Entrenando by Roanoke Ranger on Snapguide.

Second Graders in Ms. Almendarez's class completed a Problem Based Learning (PBL) challenge this last winter based on the scientific concepts of Force and Motion.  

Students were given the problem of coming up with physical activities or games that the entire student body could do during the campus Field Day that demonstrated concepts of Force and Motion.

In the second grade dual language class they needed a platform that they could write, speak and demonstrate their games/activities. Using Snapguide they were able to easily communicate via text, audibly (narration) and through video. Additionally the Snapguides were easily shared and viewed with both their fellow Roanoke Rangers and other audiences worldwide either through the iOS based app or online with any device.

When PBL meets App Smashing Field Day Fun

When the second grade at Hatfield Elementary was asked by their PE teacher to plan and design a new field day game that incorporates force, motion and/or balance, students jumped at the chance to create a great solution to this Problem Based Learning (PBL) challenge. 

To build schema students worked in groups with hands-on activities to learn about balance, rolling, spinning, and sliding. They researched various field day games using books and iPads (internet).

After students had collected enough information and understood with mastery the concepts of force, motion and balanced, they worked together to design a new game using what they learned.

Throughout the project, to cement their learning and connect ideas, students used iPads to collect observations via several apps including the camera and other platforms. Once the teams completed their research, they used Educreations to draw out a blue print of their activity. Then they worked as a team to build a model using various materials in the classroom and donated by families. In order to collect all of the information and the process, students created a PicCollage of their learning activities. They also created a Tellagami to explain how their game would be played. 

Once all of the pieces were finished, the teams created a video using Videolicious, inserting all of their previous files and recording their voices to explain the project in order to present their ideas to the PE teacher and to the rest of the school. 

The final presentation not only showcased the solution students came to for the initial problem, but captured the learning and integration that happened throughout the entire learning event.

Here is one example of the many projects completed by Hatfield Elementary's second grade led by Nicole Wallis:

Click here to see the full video presentation.

Creating Art in History - A Nontraditional Use of Google SketchUp

What’s going on behind the walls of history? The Pre - AP U.S. History class of juniors just finished their new creative art project. John Klingseisen, STEM Facilitator, created the project around a field trip to the Fort Worth Amon Carter Art Museum where students took a step inside the past by learning the ideas behind American art during the Gilded Age. The project itself consisted of a physical art piece, an informative essay including topics such as industrialization, urbanization and Progressivism, even a digital representation of the art piece.

One art piece per group was required. The essay portion was necessary for grading. This assignment was a reflection of what a student learned from personal research as well as how to follow a rubric’s criteria. The required amount of APA cited sources left in the students in charge of what they learned. On the rubric it was mandatory that every student in their essay use outside sources such as books or databases and not the more common sites like Wikipedia or Bing. The digital representation was accomplished through Google Sketchup where different textures and feature were applicable.

Nathan Patske Pre - AP U.S. History student said “Our project was the best,” piece including an electrical switch for lights. Although enjoying the project the student felt there was something missing. Nathan added “There should be checkpoints” for the progression of the art pieces to keep one single person from working on the whole art aspect.

A question for the History Facilitator was, “Next year will the project will be implemented?” The answer, yes. Perfect or not, the project broke out of the regular Project Based Learning format unlike regular history projects with informational question and monotonous reading instituting hands on art the teams were able to share and finally present to a panel of colleagues.  


STEM Academy Newsletter

By: Martin Bowser, STEM Academy Student

Blueprint Gone 3D

Written by Jacob Suchors, Ridge Hanson, and Brandon Fryer
  
     The Junior and Senior students in Mrs. DeLong's AutoCAD class recently completed their Guest House Project. The unique aspect of this project is that the students are designing a real house for a real client that is actually going to be built in Van Zandt County! The client that the house is being built for is Libby Turner, a woman who owns a plot of land in East Texas. When asked about how students reacted to having an actual client, AutoCAD teacher Mrs. Jacqueline DeLong, explains how, “By actually having a real client it motivated the students to work harder because each team wanted to see their design become a reality.”

    The students worked in teams of 2 to create the house. They used a more advanced AutoCAD program called REVIT, which allowed the students to show their design in 3D. Tucker Chaka states that, “I like Revit a lot more than the original AutoCAD because it makes everything so much easier…You can select Door, Window, Wall, etc. and place it wherever you want, whereas in AutoCAD you have to draw everything individually which makes things much more complicated and time consuming.”

    The project was designed to exploit each student’s talents in creating a home in REVIT. The situation was very real world with a real client and client wants. The students met with the client weekly and discussed ideas, the budget that was $70,000, and had the client check the progress of their designs. Having a real client added to the whole idea and helped prepare students for the real world.

.