vida bendita: Project Based Learning - The Neighborhood Project

For the past 5 years, I have worked in a Title 1 charter school serving a mostly ELL (english language learner) population. I have been lucky enough to attend countless ELL trainings, including NABE. Each year, our ELL trainer pushes the teachers to come up with new ways to expand our students language and enhance their language background and vocabulary skills. Our latest challenge was to research PBL's and incorporate them into our classroom. Before I began, I hadn't heard the term "PBL" or "Project Based Learning" but after a little research, I realized that PBL's were what teaching is all about! They are SO much fun!

Project Based Learning (PBL) is an energetic and positive classroom approach where the students are actively investigating and exploring ideas, challenges, and real-world situations to gain a deeper understanding of the knowledge and skill required to complete each task.

PBL's are extremely student led. The students experiment and explore freely, finding what works and what doesn't work all on their own. It was a challenge to loosen the reigns but it made the end result so worth it. The students showed so much pride in their project, they felt very accomplished!

Our first PBL was "The Neighborhood Project." The students worked while I documented their 2 week project. I gained a lot of insight and ideas from different Pinterest posts and blogs and have a laundry list of ideas to try next year, but I will say, "Party Rock" turned out to be a pretty excellent little town!

The Neighborhood Project

Day 1: Students brainstormed ideas on the most responsible ways to work together. We talked about the importance of compromise when building something or working with a team. The students shared "If you don't work nicely, you will get fired!" - at least they have the right work ethic instilled in them :) After, we looked up different maps on Google Earth to get an understanding of the neighborhood we live in and what different neighborhoods look like from above. Then, we took a neighborhood walk around our school. Students wrote down or drew pictures of certain features that they wanted to include in our neighborhood.

Day 2: We decided on projects for each community helper, then, each student chose a "Community Helper" job. Before the students began, we related these specific jobs to the real world to broaden their understanding of the outside world and how these projects connect to a job they could possibly have one day.

The painters mapped out the grass and lake before painting.

The architects biggest challenge was trying to make the street signs stand on their own. They had to be creative!

The engineers had a classroom volunteer, Mr. Chuck, who helped them plan, measure, and build very sturdy railroad tracks.

Day 3: The painters created flowers, trees, and other plants.

The engineers made roads for the cars.

We are so thankful for Miss Virginia at Michael's for the large donation of materials that she contributed!

Day 4: The students planned out the placement of each model.

The students came up with businesses, shops, and homes for our neighborhood. Then, they each chose the model they would create.

Day 5 & 6: CONSTRUCTION!

Thankfully, Mr. Chuck was back to help!

We also had Miss Leslie volunteer in our classroom to help us construct!

Day 7: It's time to put the neighborhood together!

Police Station

Taco Bell airport

hospital

Day 8: What should we name our neighborhood?

Luckily, we just finished our unit on "A New Nation" and "Frontier Explorers." We have discussed in great length the process of building a neighborhood from the ground up (literally). The students were able to relate our neighborhood to the process the colonists went through when they first came to America.

Each student contributed a name for the neighborhood. (My vote was for 'Kunde World')