Project Based Learning: Explained.

Problem Based Learning

 

 

Characteristics of Problem-Based Learning

Problem-based learning requires an artful combination of the following components. A skilled teacher/facilitator recognizes the value of each step and takes the time for proper preparation, assimilation, involvement, and development of the outcomes.

The following characteristics have been identified by W. J. Stepien and S. A. Gallagher:

• Reliance on problems to drive the curriculum - The problems do not test skills; they assist in the development of the skills themselves.
• The problems are truly ill-structured - There is not meant to be one solution, and as new information is gathered in a reiterative process, perception of the problem, and thus the solution, changes.
• Students solve the problems - Teachers are the coaches and facilitators.
• Students are only given guidelines for how to approach problems - There is no one formula for student approaches to the problem.
• Authentic, performance based assessment - is a seamless part and end of the instruction.

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Problem-Based Learning - What Are the Benefits?

Using PBL as a strategic tool in the classroom entails the development of the teacher as facilitator of learning, the class as strategic learners and problem solvers, and the district as an innovator and embracer of productive, progressive education. Effective PBL strategies will result in the following benefits for the teacher, the classroom, and the district:

• Problems encountered resemble the nature of problems encountered in the real world. Problems provide clues, context, and motivation; they are the maps which guide learners to useful facts and concepts.
• Since the problem cannot be clearly approached on the first encounter, it becomes a challenge, promoting creative thinking and developing organizational skills.
• Prior knowledge provides a foundation for establishing a framework for extending learning opportunities for all parties involved in the process.
• Misconceptions about teaching and learning, curriculum, math and science instruction, and learner content level understandings are revealed.
• The legitimacy of the group's as well as the individual's learning goals are established.
• The process empowers the group (student and educator alike at their own level) to assume responsibility for directing learning, defining and analyzing problems, and constructing solutions.
• Transfer of knowledge and skills is enhanced through the use of multiple tasks and problem concepts to help form functional abstractions.
• Participants are instructed in becoming responsible members of a learning community by active participation in the PBL process.
• The PBL process models a strategy that can become a foundation for a life skill- vocational training for future problem solvers.
• Common understandings and unexamined assumptions are articulated district-wide as the PBL process is employed - providing direction and opportunities for staff development activities for the future.

Very simply stated, PBL develops students who can:

• Clearly define a problem from an ill-structured situation.
• Establish and prioritize learning issues, separating fact from opinion.
• Develop alternative hypotheses through group brainstorming and mind mapping.
• Access, evaluate, and utilize data from a variety of sources - electronic resources playing a major role.
• Alter initial hypotheses after research and evaluation of new information.
• Develop clearly stated solutions that fit the problem and its inherent conditions, based on sound research and logical interpretation of this information in a group setting.

Problem-Based Learning was first established as part of the education of physicians in medical school and has been an educational institution at Southern Illinois University for over 30 years. Developed by Howard Barrows, this strategy has grown into an instructional approach which is finding success in elementary through high school throughout the state of Illinois and beyond. While its preliminary success has been documented through Illinois Math and Science Academy, PBL is now a prominent strategy in many elementary schools through high schools.

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Potential Problems in Problem-Based Learning

Students:

• Students trained in a traditional approach to learning/teaching may encounter a true "cultural change." As the teacher moves from the role of "sage on the stage" to a facilitator and coach, students may become confused and frustrated.
• Students will wish to know and understand the expectations for a high grade. Construction of a rubric will help to allay fears.
• Students must learn to be part of the group. Cooperative learning groups, if they are effectively monitored, will allow students to contribute within a given role.
• Students must feel "ownership" of the problem. They should be more concerned about solving their problem than worrying about what the teacher wants.

Teachers:

• Teachers will need to learn how to facilitate learning by "second-guessing" research needs, ensuring that there are ample materials (in print, online, and through human resources). Momentum must be maintained by careful preparation of materials.
• Teachers will also need to accept and applaud independent study that may appear chaotic and disjointed at times. A careful eye will be needed to discourage a learner's direction into a "dead end" while not appearing to direct learning - effectively killing the concept of student ownership.
• "Ill-structured" problems must be relevant to the students. Look for "windows" into students' thinking.
• The problem scenario must challenge student's initial hypotheses. Students then will develop an action plan to carry out the process.
• PBL takes time. Each stage must be completed thoroughly as the scaffolding of learning is built. Rushing the process will undermine the results.
• The scenario must be complex. Teachers must avoid oversimplifying, offering too much advice, or providing students with too many key variables.

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Think-pair-shares method

Think-Pair-Share

Think-Pair-Share activities pose a question to students that they must consider alone and then discuss with a neighbor before settling on a final answer. This is a great way to motivate students and promote higher-level thinking. Even though the activity is called think-"PAIR"-share, this is the term many instructors use for pairs and small groups (three or four students) alike. Groups may be formed formally or informally. Often this group discussion "sharing" is followed up with a larger classroom discussion. Some think-pair-share activities are short, "quick-response think-pair-share" and sometimes the activities may be longer and more involved, "extended think-pair-share." The instructor can use the student responses as a basis for discussion, to motivate a lecture segment, and to obtain feedback about what students know or are thinking and it is easy to incorporate more than one think-pair-share activity in a given class period.

Advantages of think-pair-share

• Instructors find they can have a format change during lecture that only takes a small amount of class time. Preparation is generally easy and takes a short amount of time.
• The personal interaction motivates students who might not generally be interested in the discipline.
• You can ask different kinds and levels of questions.
• It engages the entire class and allows quiet students to answer questions without having to stand out from their classmates.
• You can assess student understanding by listening in on several groups during the activity, and by collecting responses at the end.
• The fluid nature of group formation makes this technique very effective and popular for use by instructors of large classes.
• Full class discussion is generally more fruitful after a think-pair-share and throughout the semester as the frequent use of such activities generally improves student comfort levels and willingness to participate throughout a class period.

Steps and tips for using think-pair-share

1.       

Click above to watch a video of Greg Hancock, College of William and Mary, demonstrate how to use the Think-Pair-Share method at an On the Cutting Edge workshop.

Ask a question. Be aware that open-ended questions are more likely to generate more discussion and higher order thinking. A think-pair-share can take as little as three minutes or can be longer, depending on the question or task and the class size.

2. Give students a minute to two (longer for more complicated questions) to discuss the question and work out an answer.
3. Ask students to get together in pairs or at most, groups with three or four students. If need be, have some of the students move. If the instructor definitely wants to stick with pairs of students, but have an odd number of students, then allow one group of three. It's important to have small groups so that each student can talk.
4. Ask for responses from some or all of the pairs or small groups. Include time to discuss as a class as well as time for student pairs to address the question.

Examples of think-pair-share questions include:

• Describe and interpret the image. Images could include graphs, photographs, cartoons, and other visuals. Tasks and Engagement Triggers for Interactive Segments
• Before we start talking about global warming, have there been periods warmer than the present in the past? If so, when did such periods occur and what is the evidence? After responses are collected, and possibly a short lecture on climate history: How do we know what the climate was like before people started keeping track?
• From the data provided, what was the rate of the chemical reaction?
• In the context of a basic supply and demand model in the market for low skill labor, what is the expected market impact of an increase in the minimum wage, assuming the minimum wage is higher than the current market equilibrium wage? Is this potential impact used in arguments in favor of or against increases in minimum wage? Fully explain your response.
• What kinds of jobs do you think require people with knowledge of Calculus?

Challenges of the think-pair-share technique

One of the biggest challenges of the think-pair-share is to get all students to truly be engaged. Obviously, instructors hope that they have selected questions that are sufficiently interesting to capture student attention. However, the instructor might also want to consider other ways to increase the likelihood of student participation. The instructor might offer a participation grade somehow tied to a short product students produce from their discussion. Or the instructor can find ways to increase student awareness of the likelihood their group might be called upon to share their answer with the entire class. The instructor might also consider using some of the think-pair-questions on exams and making it clear to students that that is the case.

Examples of think-pair-share activities

Click above to watch a video of Greg Hancock, College of William and Mary, demonstrate the Think-Pair-Share method in the classroom.

One extension of think-pair-share is write-pair-share, in which students are given a chance to write down their answer before discussing it with their neighbor. You may wish to collect written responses from each student or each pair before or after discussing the answer. This can be particularly useful for questions where students would benefit from drawing graphs or using specific formulas in order to synthesize information.

Think-Pair-Share

grammatical translate method

An article discussing the grammar-translation approach to language learning.

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At the height of the Communicative Approach to language learning in the 1980s and early 1990s it became fashionable in some quarters to deride so-called "old-fashioned" methods and, in particular, something broadly labelled "Grammar Translation". There were numerous reasons for this but principally it was felt that translation itself was an academic exercise rather than one which would actually help learners to use language, and an overt focus on grammar was to learn about the target language rather than to learn it.

As with many other methods and approaches, Grammar Translation tended to be referred to in the past tense as if it no longer existed and had died out to be replaced world-wide by the fun and motivation of the communicative classroom. If we examine the principal features of Grammar Translation, however, we will see that not only has it not disappeared but that many of its characteristics have been central to language teaching throughout the ages and are still valid today.

The Grammar Translation method embraces a wide range of approaches but, broadly speaking, foreign language study is seen as a mental discipline, the goal of which may be to read literature in its original form or simply to be a form of intellectual development. The basic approach is to analyze and study the grammatical rules of the language, usually in an order roughly matching the traditional order of the grammar of Latin, and then to practise manipulating grammatical structures through the means of translation both into and from the mother tongue.

The method is very much based on the written word and texts are widely in evidence. A typical approach would be to present the rules of a particular item of grammar, illustrate its use by including the item several times in a text, and practise using the item through writing sentences and translating it into the mother tongue. The text is often accompanied by a vocabulary list consisting of new lexical items used in the text together with the mother tongue translation. Accurate use of language items is central to this approach.

Generally speaking, the medium of instruction is the mother tongue, which is used to explain conceptual problems and to discuss the use of a particular grammatical structure. It all sounds rather dull but it can be argued that the Grammar Translation method has over the years had a remarkable success. Millions of people have successfully learnt foreign languages to a high degree of proficiency and, in numerous cases, without any contact whatsoever with native speakers of the language (as was the case in the former Soviet Union, for example).

There are certain types of learner who respond very positively to a grammatical syllabus as it can give them both a set of clear objectives and a clear sense of achievement. Other learners need the security of the mother tongue and the opportunity to relate grammatical structures to mother tongue equivalents. Above all, this type of approach can give learners a basic foundation upon which they can then build their communicative skills.

Applied wholesale of course, it can also be boring for many learners and a quick look at foreign language course books from the 1950s and 1960s, for example, will soon reveal the non-communicative nature of the language used. Using the more enlightened principles of the Communicative Approach, however, and combining these with the systematic approach of Grammar Translation, may well be the perfect combination for many learners. On the one hand they have motivating communicative activities that help to promote their fluency and, on the other, they gradually acquire a sound and accurate basis in the grammar of the language. This combined approach is reflected in many of the EFL course books currently being published and, amongst other things, suggests that the Grammar Translation method, far from being dead, is very much alive and kicking as we enter the 21st century.

Without a sound knowledge of the grammatical basis of the language it can be argued that the learner is in possession of nothing more than a selection of communicative phrases which are perfectly adequate for basic communication but which will be found wanting when the learner is required to perform any kind of sophisticated linguistic task.