Blogs on Project-Based Learning

As you can see from the photo above, I got to politically "geek-out" on Election Night 2012. National Public Radio had put out an all-call for bloggers and other social media gurus to take part in #NPRMeetup. At this meetup, not only were we able to get up-to-the-minute developments on election results, but we were also behind the scenes at NPR Studios. The #NPRMeetup Team was comprised of a variety of individuals and political perspectives, all with their own objectives. My objective was to learn about the process and use these ideas to share with the education community in hopes that teachers might create classroom experiences that connected.

When I started playing blues songs for my first grade students, I never imagined I was introducing a fantastic launching point for thematic, standards-based teaching. We soon formed The Kids Like Blues Band, and since last March we've used blues songs as a springboard for teaching academic content standards in reading, writing, listening, speech, social studies, technology, and the visual and performing arts. So far we've played at a street fair, for staff and students at the Cal State San Marcos College of Education, and even live on local TV news and KPBS TV. We're a real band, and the students are fully engaged, learning and rocking!

John Seely Brown, renowned scientist, insightful writer, and all-around big thinker, is serious about play. Playful, adventuresome experiences that engage both mind and body are how we learn best, he told a rapt audience at the recent Powerful Learning Practice Live conference in Philadelphia.

I learned that you can lie and people will believe you. -- Greg, an eleventh grade student.

This statement would shock most people but his teachers were proud. Greg, a student at Metropolitan Arts and Technology High School in San Francisco (an Envision School), and his classmates had just finished presenting their California Proposition Campaign Ads. Greg’s reflection met one of many outcomes: that by producing media, students will become better consumers of media -- especially election campaign advertising.