Project Based Learning For High School English

Today I am talking all things project based learning in the high school English classroom. Since teaching is a second career for me, I am very passionate about good PBL in our high school classrooms. It shows the students the why behind what they are learning. In my experience (and research) PBL has a strong impact on student performance, but also can have positive effects on students’ social, emotional, and civic
development. So, if we are truly interested in educating the whole child to be a productive member of society, it starts here.

Are you wanting to start dipping your toes into project based learning but still want something to help you along the way? Check out these ready-to-go PBL units I have created for you here , here, and here!

My interest in PBL

To be clear, my first career wasn’t as a writer. Students often think that they only learn the skills we teach if they are going to be going into writing as a career. I was a professional photographer for over a decade and still maintain my business on a much smaller scale now, so in no way a writer. However, I used my excellent writing, reading, and speaking skills everyday in that business.

One day I got tired of hearing yet again, “When are we ever going to use this?” while we were learning about persuasive techniques. Because, honestly, they genuinely wanted to know. I am sure that most of my students will never go into politics, so why show them endless speeches from presidents? They needed to know how these skills could benefit them in a profession.

So, it was helpful to just pull up my FB page on the smartboard and start building a marketing campaign right there with my students.  After that, I never looked at teaching the same way again.

Let’s start with the basics of how you approach PBL in a high school classroom.

The Real World Problem

This is the heart of the project that they are working on. The key is that it needs to actually be a problem they see themselves possibly working on in the future. Students learn essential knowledge through collaborative and creative problem solving of challenging, ill-defined, real-world problems.

The key here is that it is a REAL world problem. A common problem I am encountering with my own district at this time is that they are giving our high schoolers “cutsey” problems that are in no way real world. It usually results in the students shutting down from the start because, again, they can’t see the why.

As you go through the unit, you provide instruction and checkpoints for the project that helps scaffold and support the students along the way.

For example, if you are having them work on making a children’s book. You would focus the unit on discussing skills like theme, characterization, dialogue, setting, etc. A quick formative check could be having them write their direct characterization of the protagonist and the antagonist a week or so into the unit. I personally like to read the first given description of Harry Potter to them all.

“Harry had a thin face, knobbly knees, black hair and bright-green eyes. He wore round glasses held together with a lot of Sellotape because of all the times Dudley had punched him on the nose. The only thing Harry liked about his own appearance was a very thin scar on his forehead which was shaped like a bolt of lightning. He had had it as long as he could remember and the first question he could ever remember asking his Aunt Petunia was how he had got it.”

Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone

Assessments Along the Way

As you move through the unit, challenge your students to go back to the quick formative check descriptions they had written and see what they can add to it. Teachers and content-specific professionals (if you are working with professionals in the field) assess students formatively (throughout a unit) and summatively (at the end of the unit) as students develop and present solutions to their challenge cycle problem.

Even in this brief description of Harry there is foreshadowing and mystery building behind the strange scar that no one can tell him about. Conflict with his foster family is present from the description of his glasses. Can they add something to their original, quick description that adds to the overall theme or plot of the children’s book they are working on?

If you know vaguely of how these skills work in a real profession but you are not entirely positive on the verbiage to use or the sequence things may go in- reach out to people in that profession! Most are more than happy to chat for a few minutes to make sure you are giving your students the correct info.

Students Work Together to Solve the Problem

Everyone still has their individual role. However, in PBL, every person’s contribution is vital. While, yes, the teacher provides the real world problem and academic support; the biggest skill you need to teach explicitly is collaboration skills they apply to their problem-solving process.

I have found that this is where my students need the most support. So much of their life it has been drilled into them to not “share answers” and focus on your own work. Now, they are being told (sometimes for the first time ever) to actively share in knowledge and tips with their team. Sometimes, feelings get hurt, team member don’t know what to do to be successful, bossy kids don’t know how to encourage others while getting the job done, etc.

This is where a lot of those “soft skills” come into play. In problem- and project-based learning, students
learn key content knowledge and cognitive, socialemotional, and democratic skills by solving authentic problems or completing projects that reflect a perceived need in the community.

In the beginning, I find it best to designate specific roles that are needed for the project and letting kids audition for the role as “project manager”. This helps them to understand that they will be “running the ship” in a sense and will have to have strong leadership skills… and empathy. A leader with no empathy may get results, but they probably won’t be the best.

Now, yes, there are some small exceptions to every rule. There absolutely are some PBL projects you could set to be just an individual project, but in general, you want to make it something where they are having to work with at least one other person to accomplish the task.

The Teacher Steps Back and Plays the Mentor

This doesn’t mean that you just sit there and let them learn on their own. Part of the time is direct instruction or teaching through questions. But, then, a big part is letting them find the answers and come to you for the finesse.

PBL Isn’t New

I know PBL is the big buzzword lately, but it isn’t new. For hundreds of years, children all over the world learned from doing! They learned the basics and then started internships and apprenticeships. 

Finland began having their students engage in what they call Phenomenon Based Learning years ago and (as we all know) have had amazing results. Decades before that though, you had educators such as Maria Montessori and John Dewey advocating for children to learn through doing. 

Howard Barrows was a physician and medical educator at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Medical schools at the time had been structured much like regular classrooms that could be found in grade schools throughout the United States. The teachercentered classrooms had students sitting in rows, being lectured to, and memorizing information. Barrows noticed that his medical students could memorize information and perform well on tests, but when the students had to actually apply the information to real-world situations, they struggled (Delisle, 2004).

The Impact of Project-Based Learning in the Secondary Classroom Alan Kies Northwestern College – Orange City

How often have our students been able to memorize something and spit it back out on the test…..but then could not actually DO the thing we had taught?

This is where skills or standards based (whichever you want to call it) grading comes in. I will be writing in way more depth about this next week. However, this blog post will give you some ideas to go ahead and be thinking about for now!

Just Remember That Good Project Based Learning DOES:

• Cover the standards in a meaningful way
• Lead students to deeper levels of understanding and application of the skills covered
• Help promote more engagement and motivation
• Help with differenciation naturally
• Give our students an authenticity to their education

It’s also worth mentioning that there are many great projects out there that wonderful teachers use all the time. However, there are some differences between projects and PBL.

This is where I leave you for today. Come back next week for my next installment where I will be discussing in more detail about skills based grading with PBL!

Are you wanting to start dipping your toes into project based learning but still want something to help you along the way? Check out these ready-to-go PBL units I have created for you here , here, and here!