Project-Based Learning

This entire blog post is taken from the article, "Adult Learning" by Julie Conlan, Sarah Grabowski, and Katie Smith.  

Project Based Learning

In Project Based Learning, students work in groups to solve challenging problems that are authentic and often interdisciplinary. Learners decide how to approach a problem and what activities to pursue. This is comparable to the project based learning strategies as discussed in the ebook chapter Constructionism, Learning by Design, and Project Based Learning.

• The learners gather information from a variety of sources and synthesize, analyze, and derive knowledge from it.
• The learning is inherently valuable because it is connected to something real and involves adult skills such as collaboration and reflection.
• At the end, the learners demonstrate their newly-acquired knowledge and are judged by how much they have learned and how well they communicate it.
• Throughout this process, the teacher's role is to guide and advise, rather than to direct and manage student work.

Case Study: The instructor of a pre-GED class wanted to get her students motivated to become involved in their communities. Their first step was to discuss and write about what a community was. They talked about the issues that affected the students' communities. The students took turns stating problems they thought were affecting the community the most. Through group discussion the list was narrowed down the most pressing problems. The class then put together a survey to get input from the community on these topics. This group work helped the students develop not only literacy but also social skills. The class compared the answers from neighborhood to neighborhood, looking for the biggest issues. The students decided that they would like to put together a forum for the junior high school students.

Advantages/Strengths:

• PBL gives the learner a chance to work on real-life scenarios that would be implausible on a real scale. (i.e. management training in restructuring corporations)
• It allows for cooperative learning situations which build teamwork and collaboration skills important in many adult learning situations.

Disadvantages/Weaknesses:

• PBL might not always be the best learning method when dealing with many different cultures and backgrounds because problem solving methods vary from culture to culture.

Reference

Conlan, J., Grabowski, S., & Smith, K. (2003). Adult Learning.  In M. Orey (Ed.), Emerging Perspectives on Learning, Teaching, and Technology.  Retrieved from: http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index.php?title=Adult_Learning