Recently I gave a group of teachers a presentation on Project-Based Science (PBS). In this post I want to talk about this important new movement in science education. PBS comes out of a long tradition of learning by doing in education. It has been traced back to the work of John Dewey who wrote that the teacher should, “determine the medium in which the child should be placed in order that his growth may be properly directed. He is concerned, not with the subject-matter as such, but with the subject-matter as a related factor in a total and growing experience.” (Dewey, 1902, p. 191)
More recently the New Framework for K-12 science education has supported and been informed by PBS. You can download the framework here. PBS is an important lens for guiding learning in K-12 classrooms. The five key elements of PBS are:
- Starts with driving question, problem to be solved
- Students explore by participating in authentic, situated inquiry
- Student, teachers, and community members engage in collaborative activities
- Students are scaffolded with learning technologies that help them participate
- Students create shared artifacts that address the driving question
In Project-based learning “students engage in real-world activities that are similar to the activities that adult professionals engage in.” (Krajcick and Blumenfeld, 2006, p. 317)
In PBS the question is what motivates the children and keeps them engaged. Sometimes the teacher formulates the question and other times it is generated by the students. The collaborative element of PBS is critical and now there is evidence from the learning sciences to support what good teachers have always known. Children learn effectively in groups. Also collaboration is becoming ever more prevalent in the professional scientific community and in many of the careers that our students will pursue. Also the use of technology has been recognized as an important innovation. Finally tools are being developed that allow for the type of interaction and collaboration to promote learning. The development of artifacts has always been important to promote communication skills, allow for assessment and to bring closure.
Krajcik and colleagues have been doing research on PBS for many years and have developed a PBIS curriculum series. Soon the next iteration of that work will be coming out called IQWST.
On the one hand, Project-Based science is innovative and revolutionary. On the other hand it is really a continuation of what good inquiry has always been. I think that we sometimes get too hung up on doing the latest new thing in teaching. Effective innovation is about taking the best elements of what work and tweaking them to make our practice even better. Project-Based Science is one of those key tweaks to our inquiry practice that is worth learning more about.
References:
National Research Council. (2011). A framework for K-12 science education: Practices, crosscutting concepts, and core ideas. Science Education. Washington, D.C.: The National Academies Press. Retrieved from http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=13165
Krajcik, J. & Blumenfeld, P. (2006). Project-based learning. In R. K. Sawyer (Ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of the Learning Sciences (pp. 317-333). New York: Cambridge University Press
Dewey, J. (1902). The child and the curriculum. The school and society and the child and the curriculum (pp. 181-209). New York: Teachers College Press.
Yes, yes, yes. You are correct in so many ways. While I believe you hit the nail on the head quoting Dewey and Krajcick & Blumenfeld, the issue of implementation becomes difficult because, we as trained teachers, have never practiced science. *Gasp* Most of us were formed in a system in which science is memorization and learning the process set before us. That’s what we did in K-12 and what most of us did in college as well. We loved learning science, and so that why we became teachers. Its scary to ask teachers to make science more authentic to what scientists do, because in reality, we have only been told what scientists do, not actually done it ourselves. *Double Gasp* I wasn’t even aware that this was true until I was part of a grant that allowed me to work in a neurobiology lab for a summer to DO research. It was an eye opening experience for me. Making mistakes, reworking protocol, and lots of writing are a part of doing science, and not one we often let our students experience.
I’m not trying to rain on your philosophical parade here, just vocalizing why the change to inquiry is so slow. Like you mentioned in your conclusion, this method of learning/teacher isn’t really new, learning by doing is what Dewey was talking about. But the lack of teachers who use the method is a problem. Its a systemic problem because teachers and students need more time to reflect, make mistakes, and improve as they move through their learning experiences.
Thanks so much for your thoughts, and I can tell you a HUGE part of the answer! Keep doing what you are doing.
Darci
Thanks Darci,
I totally agree with you. That is why I think that we need more than the New Framework for K-12 Science Education. We need to start experiencing science in new ways. Maybe we all need to go back to the lab. Thank you so much for your thoughts and wisdom here. I teach a science methods class at Bank Street College Graduate School of Education. For this reason a big emphasis of the course is experiencing science as learners. Often I find that teachers need to re-experience science in this new way before they are ready to think about teaching it.
-Greg