Exploring Project Based Learning

I chose My Healthy Self Project as my favorite of the six PBL projects. I liked that the project was very personalized for the students, each child could relate to the project and use the information they learned in their daily lives. Instead of simply being fed information, students had a chance to share what they do to be healthy. I also liked the way that the teacher utilized the help of other professionals to help with the product. Hearing from someone that does not usually teach them can make a learning experience more exciting and meaningful for students, as well as increasing the amount of information that the students can learn and providing the different perspectives on the information being taught. Also, the physical learning environment changed a lot for the students. The students went on different field trips and rearranged their classroom, this can also increase the amount of authentic learning that takes place. I also liked that the project included the students parents who took them on a field trip to the grocery store, causing the learning process to continue outside of the classroom.

The students reached many different levels on Bloom's Taxonomy of Higher Level Thinking. They reached the application level by learning how to use their knew knowledge about health in their daily lives. They also reached the analysis level, by determining which foods and activities are healthy and which are not. The knowledge and comprehension levels were also reached by being taught and understanding facts about being healthy.

I cannot think of many things that would improve this project, however, there was very little technology used in this project. The only technology used was when the students did research on computers. It could have been useful for the teacher to have included another use of technology in the project. Print Page in IE