Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Visit to Malcolm Price Laboratory School

This past week, I got to visit Price Lab and learn more about PBL. It is always very inspiring to get to talk to someone who is as passionate about her students as Ms. Hanna. She was doing some amazing things with her classroom and I'm so glad I got the chance to hear about them. I was amazed by all the PBL Ms. Hanna had going on in her classrooms. I can't imagine how time consuming that would be. She must be very organized to be able to keep them all going. The project I was most interested in was the opportunity for her students to create a study guide for the author of the book. I feel that doing something like that really gives the kids a purpose and meaning for doing it. So many times, I feel that kids don't want to put in the effort because they feel like it has no purpose. However, this is not the case with PBL. In this PBL, the students have the opportunity to connect with the author of the book and get their thoughts and ideas out there. It's easy to see how the kids would want to excel and succeed when they are doing projects like that. I hope that I have the opportunity to create projects and meaningful experiences for my students some day. Here is a video about other kids who are enjoying the chance to learn through PBL.

It was also really exciting to be able to talk to someone about their grading process for PBL's. It's really hard to know how to evaluate students on when they are all taking the project different ways. It was nice to be able to hear from someone who has successfully done PBL talk about how she evaluates her students.
Price Laboratory School really offers some great experiences for their students and teaches them valuable things they can use in the future. You can tell how passionate their students are just by sitting in one class. WE sat in on a physics class and got to see their presentations on solar cars. The students used many ways to present their information to the class. Some used powerpoint, websites, and one group even created a song. While sitting in on this class, it was easy to see that they enjoyed what they were learning and had great teachers leading them. I hope that I can do the same some day.

1 comment:

  1. Sounds like the trip made a difference in your perception of teaching.

    Z

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