If teachers are going to refuse to do something students expect, especially if students think it’s something they believe makes the learning easier, how teachers refuse to help is important. “I will help, but not until you’ve got some answers, part of the solution, a few examples.” “I am not going to give you the answers, but I will give you feedback on your answers. By the end of class, we’ll have a set of good answers.”

A classroom filled with student posters may suggest that students have engaged in meaningful learning. But it is the process of students' learning and the depth of their cognitive engagement— rather than the resulting product—that distinguishes projects from busywork.

A project is meaningful if it fulfills two criteria. First, students must perceive the work as personally meaningful, as a task that matters and that they want to do well. Second, a meaningful project fulfills an educational purpose. Well-designed and well-implemented project-based learning is meaningful in both ways.

I believe that we should revisit this venerable educational method before we sign its death certificate.