Professional Development

Project Based Learning: Six Hours of Professional Development (a free mini-course)

Last spring, as part of a professional development series organized by Tom Marshall (an Elementary Principal in Paramus, New Jersey), I facilitated three two-hour sessions on project based learning (PBL).

Below is an outline of the five activities that were spread out across the three sessions. In six hours total, the goal was to start with an introduction to PBL and then finish with participants feeling at least somewhat comfortable in designing their own projects. (Yes, we packed in a lot.)

There’s enough here for individuals or groups to work through these activities (or versions of them) on their own, as if it’s a self-paced PBL mini-course. Also, keep in mind, about 10-15 educators took part in the professional development. So, if you plan on using these activities to facilitate learning in your own school or district, some adaptations could be necessary.

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Session 1 of 3: What Is Project Based Learning?

Activity 1: What’s the difference between projects and project based learning?

Directions

In small groups, claim a column on this spreadsheet (which you’ll need to copy in order to use) and ask as many questions as you can related to the above graphic and the differences between projects and PBL. Your questions should be recorded in the blue. (10 minutes)
Transfer your three most important questions from your blue to your red. (5 minutes)
Group discussion based on everyone’s red questions

Resources

Activity 2: What are the essential elements of project based learning?

Directions

Read, Buck Institute’s Gold Standard PBL: Essential Design Elements.
In different small groups, using this spreadsheet (which you’ll need to copy in order to use), rank the seven essential design elements from most important to least important (column B). For each ranking, provide justification (column C).
Group discussion based on everyone’s rankings

Resources

What are your next steps?

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Here’s How We’re Moving Forward as an Elementary School…

By Ross Cooper 1 Comment

As I continue to document my journey as the Elementary Principal of T. Baldwin Demarest Elementary School (TBD) in the Old Tappan School District (which began about five months ago), here are my posts from oldest to newest:

Now let’s take a look at how we’re moving forward as a school.

Below is a slightly modified version of a document I sent out to my teachers and staff with about two weeks remaining in the school year. Going into the summer, I believe it’s beneficial for everyone to have this information, (1) in case they want to get a jumpstart with the learning over the summer, (2) so everyone knows what to expect when returning to school in the fall, and (3) so everyone can better wrap their heads around how the different areas of focus fit together.

For curriculum, this is what will serve as our main areas of focus for the 2018-2019 school year. For each area, for this blog post, I’ve included additional background information.

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Professional Development: Focusing on Student Choice

By Ross Cooper 2 Comments

Under the leadership of our Middle School Principal, Ken Parliman, we’re in the process of rethinking some of our middle level electives to provide students with more personalized learning experiences.

In preparation for these shifts, not too long ago I led the facilitation of an all-day professional learning session for our middle level specialists (those who teach the electives). I planned for this day alongside Ken and my Assistant Superintendent, Lynn Fuini-Hetten.

The theme for the day was student choice, and everything was encompassed by the essential question:

What decisions am I making for students that they could make for themselves?

What decisions am I making for students that they could make for themselves? via @spencerideas & @ajjuliani #EmpowerBook Click To Tweet

This question is from Empower, by John Spencer and A.J. Juliani. This a book I can highly recommend, and Spencer’s work served as the basis for what we accomplished.

The Agenda

Here’s the agenda for the professional learning:

The essential question was revealed and briefly discussed.
We watched and then discussed the YouTube video, 10 Ways to Empower Students With Choice, by John Spencer.

Each participating teacher chose a project he or she had already facilitated. With their projects in mind, each teacher filled out a T-Chart (in Google docs). The left-side contained the teacher choices that took place during the project, and the right-side contained the student choices.
With the following prompts in mind, participants analyzed and discussed each other’s T-Charts and projects:
- Looking at everyone’s examples of student choice, are there any possible ways you could group them into categories? What commonalities exist?
- How could you provide more student choice within your project?
- What are your reservations for providing more student choice?
With the following prompts in mind, participants read and then discussed the eBook, Getting Started with Student Choice, by John Spencer:
- Where is the author full of crap? (if at all)
- Where does the author hit the nail on the head?
- What practical tips are provided?

The Culminating Activity

Directions

Think of a project/activity you already use. Create ways to embed more student choice into it, based on “moving up” the diagram (p. 32 in the eBook, above) on your journey to the FroYo model. As you’re designing your project/activity, consider the following questions:
- Will students be designing a product? Solving a problem? Open-ended? Something else?
- As a result of the project/activity, what do you want students to understand?
- How will students be assessed and possibly, graded?
- For the lessons that take place within the context of your project/activity, (1) what content will need to be addressed, and (2) how will it be addressed?
After, share out the following:
- What was your “before” project? What is your “after” project? How do they contrast?
- What new opportunities are there for student choice? How do you think these opportunities will benefit your students?
Peer feedback.

In the End

Shortly after the session, I posted the following on Facebook:

Today I worked with my Middle School Principal to facilitate an all-day session on student choice during project design. Great stuff! Feeling inspired! (Sometimes if we remove the buzzwords and drill down to what matters, moving forward is that much easier.)

Through professional learning, there are countless ways to tackle such practices/topics as: inquiry-based learning, project based learning, personalized learning, learner agency, etc. However, often times, when we lead with these terms, we can easily intimidate and possibly “turn off” participants (especially when a district doesn’t have a common definition/understanding of what these terms involve). So, in this particular instance, we chose student choice as our entry point. By the end of the day we ended up exploring all of the above and a whole lot more. And, in the process, I do believe we comfortably “met participants where they were” without being disrespectful of the work they had already done.

Finally, as usual, I look forward to improving upon this professional learning for when we decide to roll it out again!

How do you encourage student choice?

Connect with Ross on Twitter.

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How Do Our Learning Beliefs and Project Based Learning Intersect?

By Ross Cooper 1 Comment

As mentioned in my previous post on how to promote student agency…in my school district we adopted the five learning beliefs from Education Reimagined to help drive our district vision: competency-based; personalized, relevant & contextualized; learner agency; socially embedded; open-walled.

This year, one of the main ways in which we are tackling these learning beliefs is through are innovation initiative, #YourSalisbury (formerly, Innovate Salisbury). The #YourSalisbury team consists of 15 teachers (3-4 from each of our four schools) and all of the district’s administrators. Throughout the year we meet for three all-day whole group sessions. After each of the first two, each school’s team follows up with their own full day of learning and planning at the building level. This entire initiative/framework was originally conceived of by my Superintendent, Randy Ziegenfuss, and Assistant Superintendent, Lynn Fuini-Hetten, and this is our third year of implementation.

About a week ago we held our first all-day session. In the afternoon I facilitated a one-hour activity with the goal of having participants uncover the various ways in which project based learning (PBL) provides us with a more concrete approach to realizing the learning beliefs in our learning spaces. In other words, PBL is our means; the learning beliefs are our end.

Here’s the activity, verbatim (and a printable version can be found here).

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Professional Development: 5 Ways We Broke Out of Isolation #tcrwp

By Ross Cooper 3 Comments

“Isolation is now a choice educators make. If you feel alone, it is because you are not willing to connect.”

This quote from George Couros first appeared in 2013 (according to a Google search), and due to various technologies, including social media, this quote is even more appropriate now than it was four years ago. At the same time, (1) it was also true long before 2013, although to a lesser extent, and (2) this idea could apply to any profession, not just education.

Nonetheless, many educators (for one reason or another) still generally work in silos. This fact is surprising, considering there are countless studies in which former teachers cite “lack of support” as one of the main reasons why they quit the profession. (Seriously, for related articles, Google “why teachers quit” and click around.)

That being said, whenever I facilitate professional learning, I try to model the notion of breaking out of isolation, by showing (explicitly and implicitly) that the days of one person having all the answers are long gone (if they ever existed in the first place).

For the past two years, the majority of the professional learning I’ve facilitated has focused on Writing Workshop K-5. Here are five ways we intentionally broke out of isolation during this time.

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5 Conversations from the National Principals Conference #NPC17

By Ross Cooper 2 Comments

Earlier this week I attended the National Principals Conference in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

The more I’ve immersed myself in interacting with other educators on a regular basis (through such means as social media), the more the conferences I attend have become about the who, and not so much the what. In other words, if I need an idea or resource, I don’t necessarily have to wait for a conference as I can reach out to someone whenever I want. At the same time, conferences are now primarily about connecting with old friends, making new ones (who I probably initially met on social media), inspiration, and conversations.

To illustrate the point, here are five conversations from the National Principals Conference that pushed my thinking, all of which took place on the same day.

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10 Questions About a Student-Run #Edcamp

By Ross Cooper 1 Comment

Typically in my school district, the last day of school for students is immediately followed by two full-days of optional professional learning for teachers. This year was no different. At the elementary level, the focus of the first day was inquiry-based mathematics. And, the second day contained opportunities for participants to dive into (1) Writing Workshop, which has been a focal point of ours for two years, and (2) Guided Reading, a practice we will prioritize next year.

For me (and for the teachers, I believe) the highlight of the second day was the two Edcamp-style time slots – from 9:45 to 10:45 am, and from 11 am to 12 pm – during which teachers facilitated conversations based on topics of their choosing (as long as they related to Writing Workshop or Guided Reading in one way or another). The idea was to provide teachers with opportunities to celebrate their successes, while also giving them time to plan for the future. And, much of this planning ending up occurring across grade levels and/or schools, which made this time that much more valuable.

While all of these sessions were undoubtedly worthwhile, Christina, a first grade teacher, arranged one that was notably unique. During this learning opportunity, attendees explored ways in which their students could create and publish Writing Workshop digital portfolios by combining apps that included Seesaw, Shadow Puppet, Doodle Buddy, and more. But, as much as we love these technologies, what mattered most was the fact that this session was facilitated by her first grade students.

That being said, looking back, here are ten questions I have about this student-run Edcamp.

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Grab Your Free Copy of the Hack Learning Anthology!

By Ross Cooper Leave a Comment

Over the past few years I've become a huge fan of the Hack Learning Series (which is one of the reasons why Erin and I decided to write Hacking Project Based Learning)! Each of the nine books contains ten hacks/chapters that offer practical (and easy to understand) solutions for everyday problems in the education world!

And now, with the release of the FREE Hack Learning Anthology (click to download) – which includes a publisher selected hack/chapter from EVERY book – you can get a “taste” of what each book has to offer without having to buy the whole thing!

Here's the Anthology's table of contents:

Create C.U.L.T.U.R.E: Start with School Leaders – Hacking Leadership
Teach Students to Self-Grade: Put the Power of Grading into Students' Hands – Hacking Assessment
Pineapple Charts: Boost Teacher Collaboration with a Public Chart of “Open Door” Lessons – Hacking Education
Teach Them to Tinker: Play Through the Process – Make Writing
Hash Out a Hashtag – Hacking Engagement
Spotlight Reading in Your School – Hacking Literacy
Amplify Student Voice: Incorporate Choice in How Kids Learn at Home – Hacking Homework
Shift the Ownership of Assessment: Facilitate a Progress Assessment Tool – Hacking Project Based Learning
Vigor Versus Rigor: Meet the Challenge Without Becoming Paralyzed – Hacking the Common Core
Conclusion: Good Luck – Hacking Engagement

Download the free Anthology today!

5 Lessons from Giving the Same Presentation Twice (at the same conference) #HackingPBL

By Ross Cooper 1 Comment

This past Monday at the Pennsylvania Educational Technology Expo and Conference (PETE & C), Erin and I had the opportunity to present on project based learning (PBL). While we had presented on the topic many times before, this was the first time the presentation was mostly based on the contents of our book, Hacking Project Based Learning. (Exciting!) Rather than walking the audience through the book’s ten hacks/chapters, we decided to take a unique approach by focusing on six main symptoms and remedies for PBL Paralysis (obstacles that could prevent educators from implementing project based learning: standardized testing, needing grades, poor professional development, etc.).

Following Monday’s session, Erin and I were asked (and flattered) to present the session again on Wednesday, which we did. Between the two presentations we took the time to revise and edit our work.

That being said, here are five lessons learned from giving the same presentation twice (at the same conference).

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Inquiry-Based Learning’s Impact on Professional Development #HackingPBL

By Ross Cooper 2 Comments

This post is #5 in a series of 10 posts that serve as extensions of the 10 chapters in Hacking Project Based Learning, which I coauthored with Erin Murphy. This post is an extension of Chapter 5, which focuses on essential questions. #HackingPBL

For all of the posts in the series, tap/click here.

Admittedly, it took me longer than it should have to be able to make the distinction between professional development and training.

In short, I now view professional development as the process of building capacity in participants (or attempting to do so), while training generally follows more of a rigid approach with several “rights” and “wrongs.” Overall, I believe both have a place in education. For example, for about the past two years at my district’s elementary level there have been various forms of professional development involving Writing Workshop, but in January a representative from Heinemann is going to be training these same teachers on the new Fountas & Pinnell Benchmark Assessment System.

At the same time, I have come to realize there is a third category, which can be triggered when we mistakenly believe we are providing deep professional development, but in actuality we are barely scratching the surface with not much more than conversations and examples related to a specific topic. This third category, which falls somewhere in between the other two on the “autonomy spectrum,” can be called discussion.

Since the line between discussion and professional development can easily be blurred, let’s take a look at how each of these categories applies to educators being introduced to essential questions, the topic that serves as the main focus of Chapter 5 in Hacking Project Based Learning.