The Evolution of a Project Transcript
Student: And this step motor here would drive this, that would be rocked back and forth—
Narrator: Students have to be elevated to the level of being able to truly explain what they’re learning, to be able to tell us how they’re going to implement all of this new learning that has happened. Hopefully those are skills that they’ll be able to use the rest of their lives.
When a student proposes a project, we go through a project proposal, which is pretty scripted. It’s not just, “Oh, I get to do anything I want here!” It’s a pretty scripted, detailed plan.
Teacher: So you’re feeling like this is moving along—
Student: Yup. I took apart a computer fan. I have that running through a refractor that then can generate like three point volts.
Narrator: They sit down and defend why it’s a quality enough project to get started. We look at standards. We look at dates of completion and then we give the student the go-ahead—
Teacher: You’ve got your list there.
Student: Yup.
Narrator: Students come first. If I’m working with a student and another student needs me, we have plans worked out for that. It’s so that they know how we operate. We know how they operate, and we can find a way to fulfill their needs.
Teacher: Okay, but do you feel like that’s a possible date?
Student: Oh, yeah.
Narrator: I tend to think of it as going through a student’s heart. It has to touch their emotions; it has to be relevant to them. It has to mean something to them.
Teacher: I think you’ve wrapped it up—you’ve answered your question here.
Narrator: As a student gets started, my job is to make sure that they’re actually moving along, that they’re documenting their time and learning.
Teacher: Somehow it feels like you’re contradicting—
Student: Okay. Probably just needs a sentence or two to correct it out.
Teacher: I think this practice works because you can see the growth in students. You can see the confidence.
Student: This is the circuit board that it controls my 3D printer. You can explore certain areas, like I know I wanna be an engineer because I’ve worked in the areas and I keep finding I enjoy working in that area. I enjoy working with machines and everything.
Let’s see, is the Y home set up correctly? Starting up.
Some of the subjects this would cover, probably science, engineering. There’s probably a little bit of math.
Student: All right. Are you ready?
Narrator: Then we do finalization. The students actually sit down with the same two adults that sign their paper, and they have to defend their learning.
Student: When electricity is applied to neon, it actually makes the atoms vibrate and pick up speed, which creates the light.
Narrator: The teachers will look at it, they’ll evaluate it, they’ll determine whether it’s quality enough to say that it’s done. Then the other part of the assessment is, does that actually connect to any of the state standards?
Teacher: You have mercury and phosphorus also darkened. Why?
Student: Because when they put argon gas in tubes for neon signs, they add a drop of mercury to intensify the color.
Teacher: Okay. Good.
Narrator: They gradually build the idea that if I’m going to get credit for this, I have to defend myself. But most of the time, they’ve chosen it. They know it, and so they go to a planning team and they can come up with the facts, but they can also answer questions. Why is this important to me? Why is it important to the world?
Student: Can I help?
[End of Audio]
2 Comments
Anina Byerly Jun 14, 2022 5:23pm
Watching this video was interesting because the students were completely organized throughout the whole process and this tool is great for teaching project management.
Taleb Rostami Jan 24, 2015 3:08pm