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EEND678 Artifact 1 -- PBL Planning

The first artifact that I chose to reflect on from this course was the PBL planning assignment. I chose to include this artifact in my reflection because I felt as though it really challenged me. While I had certainly heard of project based learning prior to this course, I had not actually spent anytime pursuing how I could implement project based learning (PBL) into my class. In the general overview I had of PBLs, I could not see how this model could be one I used given curriculum demands, time constraints, and IEP goals to be working on. The creation of this assignment forced me to reevaluate my previous notions of this type of learning. In preparation for this assignment, I utilized some resources that helped me to do this reevaluation. For instance, the Edutopia article “What the Heck is Project-Based Learning?”, written by Heather Wolpert-Gawron, clarified that while there are many elements that define PBL, not every project has to meet every element in order to be classified as this type of learning. When discussing the elements of PBL, Wolpert-Gawron states, “Brief note here: Don't panic. You don't need every single one of these elements to call your unit PBL. These are elements to strive for, not to kill yourself to achieve.” This helped me realize I could achieve many of these elements in designing instruction to meet my student’s needs. 

Through the completion of PBL planning assignment I was able to identify three different projects that I felt confident could address the developmental needs of my students, align with district curriculum, and provide me accurate and usable data to report on and update IEP goals. 

Here is the outline of my PBLs:



Some challenges of creating this type of assignment is that it takes a great deal of planning and forethought. Teachers have to be okay with transferring ownership of the final products from themselves to students. Also, thinking of how to implement technology in a variety of ways and to make learning authentic, can also be a challenge. If we were not a one to one district, I am not sure how I would have conquered this aspect of PBLs. Lastly, while not many teachers in my building are doing this kind of work, if they were, I imagine it would be a challenge to find new sources of information and technology so that students are not repeating the same sort of processes across all of their classes. 

Since the assignment for this class was to design instruction for students, this could be easily implemented into the classroom. After doing this brainstorming, creation of a UBD (see next blog post) would help to solidify the instruction that students would be receiving. I think completing an outline like this at the beginning of the year or semester would be a great planning tool for teachers to think about how they could begin to use project based learning in their classrooms!

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