Creative Teaching and Learning

How to plan for project-based learning

Although famously learner-led, project-based learning does require a fair amount of teacher planning to be at its most successful. Alexis Shea continues her series on strategies for successful PBL with a step-by-step guide to planning a project from beginning to end.
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Learning habits are so important to success in life, yet time is so rarely dedicated to developing them in school. We take for granted skills like being able to communicate effectively with people in a range of contexts, knowing how to create a plan of action to achieve a long-term goal and staying resilient in the face of challenges. It is these competencies which employers are saying young people entering the workforce are lacking, so we cannot assume that all learners will simply pick them up as a matter of course.

Project-based learning (PBL) is an approach which intentionally focuses on developing these learning habits. It is a long-term process, which involves helping pupils reflect on and make progress with their learning habits as they work through each new project. Its purpose is not simply to produce project outcomes, but to develop independent life-long learners.

It is therefore best to view projects as vehicles for developing learning habits. These learning habits form the basis for planning any project. They are not the only consideration, of course. The first article in this series highlighted several elements that comprise successful PBL, and each of these elements will require planning for – but how?

Where to start?

Firstly, it is important to try not to look at each project as a discrete learning experience. Of course, there needs to be a range of projects to give learners access to a diverse curriculum; however, they should be seen as part of a continuum, with each new project building on the previous one. For example, a pupil who has learnt how to speak in front of an audience in one project may, in the subsequent project need to learn how to lead a small group.

Projects must aim to build on prior learning and enable pupils to practise new skills in a range of situations. Like many aspects of planning for PBL, this is very similar to longer-term planning in other curriculum areas.

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