When people ask about the inspiration for our style of videos, I often say that our videos reflect the way that I wish I had learned in school. My learning style wasn't a good match for the way I was taught.
Recently we completed a custom video project with the Buck Institute for Education (BIE) that focuses on a Project Based Learning or "PBL", and boy did it open my eyes. I can now see that I needed teachers who put PBL to work. I needed to get up from my desk and engage. I needed to work on a real-world issue and use creativity and problem solving - what are known as 21st century skills these days.
This video is an introduction to PBL and how it impacted a science teacher's students and helped their community.
CUP makes educational projects about places and how they change.
Our projects bring together art and design professionals - artists, graphic designers, architects, urban planners - with community-based advocates and researchers - organizers, government officials, academics, service-providers and policymakers. These partners work with CUP staff to create projects ranging from high school curricula to educational exhibitions.
This page contains web-based projects created by students at the University of Richmond in partial fulfillment of the requirements for teacher licensure in the state of Virginia.
The TUBRIC is not only a great hands-on activity for teachers during professional development, but it's also a great collaborative tool to help your students create their own Driving Questions for their projects. So just download it, print it, and build it!
In a growing number of schools, educators are echoing Papert's assertion that engaging students by starting with the concrete and solving hands-on, real-world problems is a great motivator. Ultimately, they say, such project-based learning that freely crosses disciplines provides an education superior to the traditional "algebra at age nine, Civil War at ten, Great Expectations at eleven" structure.
With an old computer and 30 dollars worth of off-the-shelf components, you can gear up with cutting edge avian monitoring technology and help save the birds.