Week 9 Brian Crosby and Project Based Learning.

The video entitled Passion-basedlearning in action: Brian Crosby at TEDxDenverEd was really inspiring.  Brian Crosby, who is a 4^th grade Nevada teacher is the epitome of a project based teacher.  I love the way he teaches.  I love the thematic way he incorporates every subject through multiple ways of thinking about things and project-based learning. You know, as a high school teacher, the thing I thought about the most after viewing this video was we are doing high school education WRONG.  I have been thinking this subliminally all along but as I am writing this, I am discovering what I mean by this.  Elementary schools have one or two teachers that teach all the subjects for a small (hopefully small) group of kids.  Why is it that for high school, we divide the subjects up?  I am never able to mind my own subject.  I am forever incorporating social studies, art, science, etc into my lessons.  I have been wondering lately, why it is that we have separate English classes…. What is English?  The language that we speak?  Grammar?  Communication?  Literature?  It is nothing if it is not tied to everything else we are and do… 

I like teaching thematically.  I want every assessment to connect… I want to teach using projects.  I really think this is the way to go and that you can inspire students to be interested and love learning.  I have so many thematic units chasing around in my head…  Crosby’s video definitely got me fired up about developing them.  The workload for creating these units is both exciting and daunting.  I feel like there is never enough time or support to get this kind of learning experience properly planned and executed… especially when you have 150 students in a year spread over a multiplicity of classes!

He did such a great job of incorporating so many tools and resources and he made it look effortless!  I mean, these kids were creating videos, blogging, skyping, writing and responding to others, reaching out to the global community in a multiplicity of ways… AND he met like a million core standards for science, math, reading and writing and technology.  I want him on my team!

I liked some of the concepts he mentioned at the end when he quoted the letter from the high school teacher who said that  “Active learning” means empowering students to become learners and that there is a difference between working with a student who knows how to be “taught” and creating a “learner”.

I also agreed in his global, categorical view on who should have access to a good education…  He discusses how this type of environment should not be the exception, nor should it be the norm only for privileged students.  It is definitely a way of teaching that is worth the effort… but I think a little restructuring of the school is necessary to accommodate this type of environment.    The wiki site administrator wrote under the video:

“The lessons Brian shares in this video were NOT easy to teach. Project-based learning, challenge-based learning, or passion-based learning is NEVER easy. It takes a LOT of time. It takes lots of planning. And it takes lots of passion. When it is done well, however, it can lead to unforgettable learning experiences and the kind of "deep" skill development for students which can't help but "stick" for a lifetime.”