It Should Keep Getting Better

Projects - Love them or hate them, but you will have them.  This is especially true in science.  There are some concepts that simply must be learned by doing, not to mention all the non-academic learning that comes from projects (which I should write a post on in the future because it is so important).  Because projects matter so much, it is important that we use reflective professional judgment to decide how students can best use their time rather than throwing every good idea we have at them, overwhelming them with work.

When deciding on whether to do a new project, tweak an old one, or keep it exactly as it was this year, there are some questions you need to ask yourself.
1.  What is the academic objective?
2.  What is the "other" objective?  (This could be social, behavioral, or even spiritual)
3.  What are they learning from this project that they cannot learn by doing it some other way?
4.  If retooling a previous project, what can I do to reduce confusion or increase efficiency?  What did someone do last year that I can incorporate this year?

After asking those questions, you may reach one of three conclusions about your project.

1. It should be dropped altogether as it has become a Grecian Urn.  If you don't have time or inclination to read the excellent Cult of Pedagogy post about Grecian Urn projects, here's the summary.  A Grecian Urn is any activity whose time and effort are disproportionate to the learning outcomes.  Something might be fun, but if it is taking days of class time, it should also be rather meaningful.  If it is not, drop it or give it to kids as an optional at home (extra credit if you believe in that sort of thing) activity.  If it is that fun, they'll want to.  If they don't, it probably wasn't as fun as you thought.

2.  The project should stay exactly as it is.  I'm going to suggest that this particular conclusion is rare.  It is difficult for me to believe your project is perfect exactly as is and that making changes could only do damage to the result.  Some projects are classic traditions that everyone should do (e.g physics egg drop project) because it unites us as learners across generations, but that doesn't mean those projects shouldn't change with technology or renewed priorities.  Before you settle into this conclusion, give it some serious thought.

3.  Tweak the project.  I submit to you that this is going to be the answer about 75% of the time.  If you are a creative and interesting teacher who cares enough about your skills to be reading education blogs, you probably had a good idea.  The process of reflection should allow you to identify what was really good about that idea and what needs to be changed.  This may happen only a couple of times, or it may happen every year of your time teaching a course. 

An example will likely help, so let me tell you about a project in my physics class that used to be called "The Electricity Project."  Warning: It plays out over multipl years, so it is long.

I have a healthy respect (that sometimes rises to the level of fear) for electricity.  It's one of the few things in my home I won't tackle on my own.  I don't know what caused this in me, but I don't want to pass it on to my students; so fifteen years ago, I started assigning a project in which they simply had to do some electrical circuit building (series, parallel, and combination circuits were my only requirements).  Many of them built a model of a house and lit each room.  Some built models of car lots or airports and lit each car or plane in series but the runway or lot lights in parallel.  These were all fine and accomplished the instructional objective "recognize the three types of circuits" and my personal behavioral objective "don't be afraid of 9V batteries."  This was fine for a time, and the kids enjoyed it.  They were also nice to have at student showcase nights.

Seven years ago, two students asked if they could do something that was electrical but didn't fit the project instructions.  If you teach high school, you know why I heard this with a skeptical ear at first.  Then, they proposed their idea.  They wanted to build an electric guitar from scratch.  "Umm, that's the coolest thing I've heard.  Yes, of course, you can do that."  I changed the rubric, not just for that year but for the future.  Instead of "build a model with circuits," the requirement became "build a functioning electrical device."  It still fulfilled the objectives the previous version had, but you wouldn't believe the difference in creative projects I got.  I had students who built games that would allow a bell to ring or light to come on when you got a correct answer.  I had some fun electrical versions of tic-tac-toe.  A student attempted to build a theremin.  I even got a Jacob's Ladder and a tiny rail gun that fired paper clips one year and a Tesla coil that had to be operated outside the next.  Because they were so interactive, we had a day of electrical fun, setting them out all over the room and inviting people to come and play with them. 

Four years ago, our school started really pressing in on the idea of Challenge Based Learning.  What would kids do if we took the constraints off and gave them a real-world kind of problem?  Knowing that the addition of another project would be burdensome to all involved, I brainstormed with our technology coach about how I might adjust an already existing project to become challenge based.  I decided on the electricity project.  Given how many people around the world have limited access to electricity, that seemed an ideal problem to solve with their knowledge of physics.  Also, at that time, our IT director was a former missionary to Haiti, where he had his own challenges with keeping electricity consistent in his home.  "Out with electrical device building . . . In with electrical problem solving," I thought.  I don't have time to tell you about the epic failure we had in the first year of this project, and I've already written about it, so read that here.

The next year, as I reflected on the project, I decided that clearer instruction was needed.  Perhaps I had taken the challenge based learning tenant that the teacher shouldn't have an end in mind a little too seriously.  I assigned groups and adjusted directions but had essentially the same project (check here for those adjustments).  Things were better but still not what I was hoping for (I've blogged about this a lot, apparently - see here for that year's result).  I wanted some real ideas, not just windmills.  The next year, we began our year with brainstorming groups in teacher meetings.  If you had an idea but needed input, you presented it to other teachers (mostly outside your own area).  Two teachers said, "It sounds like your idea is a little too hypothetical.  What if you gave them a real place?"  When we began brainstorming sessions last year, I was astounded by the difference that made.  Suddenly, I heard them taking weather into account because "you can't have solar panels in a place with sandstorms all year."  They were discussions about how difficult it would be to find diesel fuel in their particular part of the world or whether it was even windy there.  The fact that they were researching the resources of the area brought this project so much closer to what I envisioned.

Then, the biggest change happened quietly and almost accidentally.  The group that was assigned to Yemen came to me and said that the biggest problem with their lack of electricity was that they had so little clean water.  "Can we build a solar-powered water pump?"  As with the electric guitar, I didn't want to say no to a good idea just because it didn't fit what I had in mind.  Of course they could build a solar-powered water pump.  Aside from the atrocious spelling in their video, this was the best project of all the groups and the one people talked about the most.  They were compelling and knowledgeable and, most of all, invested in their solution.  This challenged me to change this project once again.

I consulted with our current tech coach about broadening the project.  Instead of focusing on electricity, I would assign the area.  Then, they had to decide what was the most critical challenge before them that could be addressed by physics/engineering.  Not knowing what they would decide, I wasn't sure building something was practical, so he suggested grant-style presentations with PSA videos.  Yes, this was coming together.  Of the 8 groups, six said lack of access to potable water was the biggest need in their area, one said flooding led to disease and water problems, and one said sanitation was an issue (because they had garbage and raw sewage in their streets).  In the six groups that addressed water access, there were six different solutions.  This showed me that they did, in fact, research what made the most sense for that country.  I was so proud of their results, and we got great feedback from those who attended the forum.  This was finally the challenge based learning project I wanted it to be.

You may have noticed that the objectives had changed.  No one built anything that had to do with circuits.  I accomplished that objective in one day of handing out 9V batteries, wire, and Christmas tree light bulbs with the instructions to "play and tell me what you learned" after a day of teaching about the different circuits.  That was a memorable day as one group pretty much tased themselves for twenty minutes by linking 32 batteries together and touching wires, showing that they weren't afraid of it.  This project is so much more meaningful that I can't imagine going back to building a simple model to show you can make circuits.  They can learn that another way.  This project now gives them things they couldn't have learned in another way.

If you teach for several years, your project should be getting better.  You may not have one that changes as much as this one did, but don't be afraid if you do.  Share the progression with the students.  They need to see that we continue learning.  They need to know that you have deep thought about the reasons for what you assign them.  They need to know that we haven't arrived at perfect ideas yet but that we are always reaching for them.  If you want them to keep getting better, you should be too.