Week #7 - Project Based Learning

I am very enthusiastic about Project Based Learning. It makes so much sense to me. I think the most important thing we can do in education is to teach students to become life-long learners. Think about how we learn as adults. Two recent projects at home had my family researching and learning new information - raised garden beds and raising chickens.

My daughter wanted chickens so we started to research what that would involve. We started with what types of chickens we should get. We talked to chicken farmers and the people at our local Blue Seal store. We researched information on the internet and learned all about raising chickens. We chose Barred Rocks. Next we needed a coop - What size? How are the roosts built? How many nesting boxes? Where should we place it in the yard? Should we build or buy? The questions and research have gone on for 2 years now. How do we protect the chickens from hawks? Fox? What do we do when one chicken is plucking another? How do we introduce a new brood to the older hens? And on and on. We are learning science, economics, math, cooperation, research skills, carpentry, social skills, and responsibility.


The same research was needed when planting our vegetable garden this year. What dimensions for the boxes? How should we lay out the beds? What do we do to the soil? Let's test the pH and nitrogen levels. The compost? From our chickens. What time of year do we plant the different seeds? Why are my zucchinis starting to form then turn yellow and fall off the plant? Possibly due to lack of pollination, so we check on our male and female flowers, a science lesson for my daughters which grew into "birds and bees" conversations. Again.. the learning goes on and on.


Why do we adults continue to learn? We learn what is meaningful to us or what is necessary to solve our own problems. We are rewarded now with eggs and comic relief from our chickens and green beans and cucumbers from our garden. I have enjoyed learning and working on these projects with my family. These are definitely group projects and it is fun to learn together.

The next project...How do we get the skunk to stay out of our compost pile (since we need to lock up our hens at night and the skunk has become a regular visitor then)? Mike has taken care of this problem. He has rigged this Wile E. Coyote type of trap (only for the skunk, not the Road Runner) where a log might fall on the skunk when he tries to pull away part of the compost fence. The log didn't drop on the skunk as envisioned, however, I think it has worked to drop the log and scared the skunk away. This is good since I'm not sure what we may have done with an unconscious skunk.


If we as adults want to learn about things that are applicable and meaningful to our lives, why wouldn't children want to learn the same way? I think Project Based Learning (when the projects are meaningful to the students) is the best way to teach.