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I am an English teacher from Ukraine. I have been teaching for more than 20 years already but I am always eager to learn something new, share ideas and teaching techniques and meet new friends. I am looking forward to starting this course as I have already tried some PBL in my class but I would definitely want to know more about project-based learning. I am working activily in eTwinning projects and other international projects.

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I am teaching in Taras Shevchenko Gymnasia. It's not very big, only about 800 students. I teach English to 5-11 graders. Usually we have 4 hours of English a week. We are using authentic textbooks Laser, Wider World and Focus. I have a computer and wi-fi in my classroom so I involve my students in various international online projects such as Etwinning, PenPals etc. We also use Google classroom with all our classes.

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1.1 What is PBL

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An Introduction to Project-Based Learning

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Share some reactions to the video here, in particular identifying any questions you have about PBL, what you hope to learn on this course and what challenges you anticipate in adopting PBL in your school.
I think PBL is not just a project way. it's a completely different way of teaching and learning. It's a very exciting and engaging way of getting new knowledge and developing such important skills of the 21st century as critical thinking, researching and analysing materail, collaboration, presentation skills, digital literacy. It's a very active and motivating way for students to obtain knowledge.
During this course I hope to learn  how to organize PBL in accordance with our school curruculum and school program. Also it's is important to understand how to motivate students and keep them actively engaged in the project.
Assessment of work is also another issue we should take into account, how to create rubrics and how to assess various parts of the project and students' work and participation.

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Propositions Project: 21st Century Skills

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1.3 Optional P2P - Reflections on our current teaching practice

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1.3 Optional P2P - Reflections on our current teaching practice

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I teach English to several classes of different age ranging from 10 to 17. The groups are pretty small, about 8-12 students each which allows to use group work and when possible technologies. I am trying to organize cooperative and collaborative learning, but sometimes we still have to use traditional methods of teaching. The students are sitting in two rows facing each other which allows more opportunities for collaboration. I use computer and when wi-fi is good students can use their smartphones or tablets for some activities.
Mostly, I teach English Grammar, Vocabulary and skills, but at the same time I try to introduce CLIL and develop the 21st century skills at the lessons. Usually students do a lot of different activites in class, we read and discuss the texts, check their comprehension through different tasks, listen to audio materials and do tasks, watch video, discuss things, make up dialogues, do some role-playing,  do a lot of grammar and vocabulary exercises, do some projects, organize mini-debates, play games. I am trying to use collaborative approach whenever possible. I am sure that my classes could benefit a lot from PBL.
I am thinking of trying PBL with my 7-graders. We are starting the topic "School life" and I am going to experiment with PBL.

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5 Keys to Rigorous Project-Based Learning

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Share your view on which of the 5 components (or keys as they are called in the video) you feel will be the most challenging for you to realize and why.
I reckon in my situation the most challenging part would be Real World Connection, as I teach English and the scope of projects I could do is a bit limited. Besides, a student-driven aspect can be a problem, as sometimes it's difficult to get equal involvement of the students into the work process, some of them can just wait till the others do all the job.
Another aspect I am anxious about is assessment, especiallyformative.

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Our mission is to realize the power and promise of 21st century learning for every student-in early learning, in school, and beyond school-across the country and around the globe.

As the pioneers in this movement, champions of the 4Cs (Critical Thinking, Communication, Collaboration, and Creativity), and creators of the Framework for 21st Century Learning, P21 is the premier organization ensuring every child-without exception-experiences 21st century learning.

Now Creating Even Greater Impact

And now, as a part of Battelle for Kids, P21 has even greater ability to make tangible and immediate impacts.

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As the pioneers in this movement, champions of the 4Cs (Critical Thinking, Communication, Collaboration, and Creativity), and creators of the Framework for 21st Century Learning, P21 is the premier organization ensuring every child-without exception-experiences 21st century learning. And now, as a part of Battelle for Kids, P21 has even greater ability to make tangible and immediate impacts.

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1.6 Optional P2P - Your PBL Design: Formulating your driving question

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1.6 Optional P2P - Your PBL Design: Formulating your driving question

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Mostly, I teach English Grammar, Vocabulary and skills, but at the same time I try to introduce CLIL and develop the 21st century skills at the lessons. Usually students do a lot of different activites in class, we read and discuss the texts, check their comprehension through different tasks, listen to audio materials and do tasks, watch video, discuss things, make up dialogues, do some role-playing,  do a lot of grammar and vocabulary exercises, do some projects, organize mini-debates, play games. I am trying to use collaborative approach whenever possible. I am sure that my classes could benefit a lot from PBL.
I am thinking of trying PBL with my 7-graders, they are 11-12 years old. We are starting the topic "School life" and I am going to experiment with PBL. My aim is to develop their critical thinking skills, collaboration and presentation skills. Also they are going to learn new  topical vocabulary, watch related videos and compare schools in different countries, read some texts,  I want them to learn how to compare and analyse the material, and come up with own ideas. I am still considering in what format I want them to present their final product, maybe it will be an oral presentation. They will use some itools while doing this project, I am still considering which ones.
But the driving question will be something like this: Compare schools in different countiries and your own school, their facilities, subjects range, extracurricular activities. Think of the ways how we could improve our own school so that it would fit perfectly the students' needs and they would be eager to study there. (decide what subjects you would study and why, what activities they would have, what methods teachers should use, what facilities the school should have etc,)

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2. Developing effective collaboration for PBL

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2. Developing effective collaboration for PBL

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Collaboration is sharing ideas, experience, skills in order to produce something together, it's interdependence and mutual contribution into one common project.

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FCS | Module 3 | Collaboration | Deirdre Butler, National University of Ireland

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2.3 Effective Collaboration for PBL inside the Classroom

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2.3 Effective Collaboration for PBL inside the Classroom

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Structuring Collaboration for Student Success: Keys to PBL Series Part 3

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2.3 Effective Collaboration for PBL inside the Classroom

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2.3 Effective Collaboration for PBL inside the Classroom

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5 Strategies for Fostering a Collaborative Culture in a PBL Classroom | MyPBLWorks

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Start creating a culture of independent learning in your classroom.

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Teaching Group Work: Building Student Collaboration and Agency

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2.4 Finding collaboration partners outside the classroom

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2.4 Finding collaboration partners outside the classroom

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2.4 Finding collaboration partners outside the classroom

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2.4 Finding collaboration partners outside the classroom

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Community Partners: Making Student Learning Relevant

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Our school is pretty active in eTwinning projects as well as PenPals project in which we have the possibility to collaborate with international partners. Besides, we sometimes invite some experts from our local community to talk to students about STEM professions. Also there are some NGOs that can conduct trainings on social issues with the students.

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2.4 Finding collaboration partners outside the classroom

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2.4 Finding collaboration partners outside the classroom

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Our school is pretty active in eTwinning projects as well as PenPals project in which we have the possibility to collaborate with international partners. Besides, we sometimes invite some experts from our local community to talk to students about STEM professions. Also there are some NGOs that can conduct trainings on social issues with the students.

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FCS | Module 1 | Tool for Teaching: TeamUp

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http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/
https://www.voscreen.com/
https://www.genial.ly/
https://www.storyjumper.com/
http://www.emergingedtech.com/2014/05/20-excellent-free-tools-for-interactive-collaboration-experiences-in-the-classroom/
http://newtech.coe.uh.edu/category.cfm?typename=collaboration&typeid=9
https://answergarden.ch/
https://realtimeboard.com/
https://www.diigo.com/
http://www.edupad.com/itooch/education-apps-tablets-smartphones/
http://www.adobe.com/products/adobeconnect.html
https://piktochart.com/
https://bubbl.us/
https://www.emaze.com/
http://www.knovio.com/
https://www.posterini.com/en
https://www.mindomo.com/
http://etherpad.org/
https://www.educreations.com/
https://www.mindmeister.com/ru
http://www.wikispaces.com/content/classroom/about
https://www.classtools.net/random-name-picker/
https://scrumy.com/
https://learningapps.org/

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3. Developing student-driven activities for PBL

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3. Developing student-driven activities for PBL

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When I was 35 we had a kind of a Talent Show at school "Dancing with a teacher" and I was invited to participate with my student. I was mostly doing sports and karate before and for me it was a real challenge. I even wanted to stop practicing as I could count the music correctly and could move smoothly in rumba. But we worked hard, we won, and dancing has become my passion. Now I am an active dancer and even participate in competitions in Seniors category))) I don't like to give up and I now I always teach my students that hard work brings its fruits!

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3.1 Scaffolding for Student Ownership and Independence

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3.1 Scaffolding for Student Ownership and Independence

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3.1 Scaffolding for Student Ownership and Independence

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3.1 Scaffolding for Student Ownership and Independence

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Facilitating Learning in a Student-Driven Environment: Keys to PBL Series Part 4

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Strategies to develop students' confidence

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Strategies to develop students' confidence

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3 tips to boost your confidence - TED-Ed

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Sometimes we donpt realize that we weaken our students' confidence when we don't give them praise but just point out their mistakes, even minor. We should avoid doing this and we should do everything to create learning environment in our class in which the student will feel support and won;t be afraid to speak up his mind. Besides, students should see the enthusiasm and motivation of their teahcer, teachers should become role model for the students, and this will help them fell more confident. Another important point is that the teacher should emphasise that every mistake or failure is just another extra step to success!

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View the interactive image by Kornélia Lohyňová

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The Cycle of Learning If a child stays curious, he will continue to explore and discover. The 5-year-old finds tadpoles in a tiny pool of mud on the playground. This discovery gives him pleasure. When he experiences the joy of discovery, he will want to repeat his exploration of the pond.

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Thinking outside the box is more than just a business cliché. It means approaching problems in new, innovative ways; conceptualizing problems differently; and understanding your position in relation to any particular situation in a way you'd never thought of before. Ironically, its a cliché that means to think of clichéd situations in ways that aren't clichéd.

We're told to "think outside the box" all the time, but how exactly do we do that? How do we develop the ability to confront problems in ways other than the ways we normally confront problems? How do we cultivate the ability to look at things differently from the way we typically look at things?

Thinking outside the box starts well before we're "boxed in" - that is, well before we confront a unique situation and start forcing it into a familiar "box" that we already know how to deal with. Or at least think we know how to deal with.

Here are 11 ways to beef up your out-of-the-box thinking skills. Make an effort to push your thinking up to and beyond its limit every now and again - the talents you develop may come in handy the next time you face a situation that "everybody knows" how to solve.

1. Study another industry.

I've learned as much about teaching from learning about marketing as I have from studying pedagogy - maybe more. Go to the library and pick up a trade magazine in an industry other than your own, or grab a few books from the library, and learn about how things are done in other industries. You might find that many of the problems people in other industries face are similar to the problems in your own, but that they've developed really quite different ways of dealing with them. Or you might well find new linkages between your own industry and the new one, linkages that might well be the basis of innovative partnerships in the future.

2. Learn about another religion.

Religions are the way that humans organize and understand their relationships not only with the supernatural or divine but with each other. Learning about how such relations are structured can teach you a lot about how people relate to each other and the world around them. Starting to see the reason in another religion can also help you develop mental flexibility - when you really look at all the different ways people comprehend the same mysteries, and the fact that they generally manage to survive regardless of what they believe, you start to see the limitations of whatever dogma or doxy you follow, a revelation that will transfer quite a bit into the non-religious parts of your life.

3. Take a class.

Learning a new topic will not only teach you a new set of facts and figures, it will teach you a new way of looking at and making sense of aspects of your everyday life or of the society or natural world you live in. This in turn will help expand both how you look at problems and the breadth of possible solutions you can come up with.

4. Read a novel in an unfamiliar genre.

Reading is one of the great mental stimulators in our society, but it's easy to get into a rut. Try reading something you'd never have touched otherwise - if you read literary fiction, try a mystery or science fiction novel; if you read a lot of hard-boiled detective novels, try a romance; and so on. Pay attention not only to the story but to the particular problems the author has to deal with. For instance, how does the fantasy author bypass your normal skepticism about magic and pull you into their story? Try to connect those problems to problems you face in your own field. For example, how might your marketing team overcome your audiences normal reticence about a new "miracle" product?

5. Write a poem.

While most problem-solving leans heavily on our brain's logical centers, poetry neatly bridges our more rational left-brain though processes and our more creative right-brain processes. Though it may feel foolish (and getting comfortable with feeling foolish might be another way to think outside the box), try writing a poem about the problem you're working on. Your poem doesn't necessarily have to propose a solution - the idea is to shift your thinking away from your brain's logic centers and into a more creative part of the brain, where it can be mulled over in a non-rational way. Remember, nobody has to ever see your poem...

6. Draw a picture.

Drawing a picture is even more right-brained, and can help break your logical left-brain's hold on a problem the same way a poem can. Also, visualizing a problem engages other modes of thinking that we don't normally use, bringing you another creative boost.

7. Turn it upside down.

Turning something upside-down, whether physically by flipping a piece of paper around or metaphorically by re-imagining it can help you see patterns that wouldn't otherwise be apparent. The brain has a bunch of pattern-making habits that often obscure other, more subtle patterns at work; changing the orientation of things can hide the more obvious patterns and make other patterns emerge. For example, you might ask what a problem would look like if the least important outcome were the most important, and how you'd then try to solve it.

8. Work backwards.

Just like turning a thing upside down, working backwards breaks the brain's normal conception of causality. This is the key to backwards planning, for example, where you start with a goal and think back through the steps needed to reach it until you get to where you are right now.

9. Ask a child for advice.

I don't buy into the notion that children are inherently ore creative before society "ruins" them, but I do know that children think and speak with a n ignorance of convention that is often helpful. Ask a child how they might tackle a problem, or if you don't have a child around think about how you might reformulate a problem so that a child could understand it if one was available. Don't run out and build a boat made out of cookies because a child told you to, though - the idea isn't to do what the child says, necessarily, but to jog your own thinking into a more unconventional path.

10. Invite randomness.

If you've ever seen video of Jackson Pollock painting, you have seen a masterful painter consciously inviting randomness into his work. Pollock exercises a great deal of control over his brushes and paddles, in the service of capturing the stray drips and splashes of paint that make up his work. Embracing mistakes and incorporating them into your projects, developing strategies that allow for random input, working amid chaotic juxtapositions of sound and form - all of these can help to move beyond everyday patterns of thinking into the sublime.

11. Take a shower.

There's some kind of weird psychic link between showering and creativity. Who knows why? Maybe it's because your mind is on other things, maybe it's because you're naked, maybe it's the warm water relaxing you - it's a mystery. But a lot of people swear by it. So maybe when the status quo response to some circumstance just isn't working, try taking a shower and see if something remarkable doesn't occur to you!

Do you have strategies for thinking differently? Share your tips with us in the comments.

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Thinking outside the box is more than just a business cliché. It means approaching problems in new, innovative ways; conceptualizing problems differently; and understanding your position in relation to any particular situation in a way you'd never thought of before. Ironically, its a cliché that means to think of clichéd situations in ways that aren't clichéd.

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In my country we have standardized assessment criteria (1-12 points). At the same time, we usually have tests at the end of each theme, or at the end of the semester. Besides, teachers are free to assess an assignment, project or task they give to students. I teach English so I try to use both formative and summative assessment in accordance with the lesson aims.

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Embedding Assessment Throughout the Project: Keys to PBL Series Part 5

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Peer Assessment: Reflections from Students and Teachers

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I only recently started to use peer assessment and mostly with some written works in class or in project work, when students assess their collaboration, involvement and interdependence. I think such kind of assessment really help students to develop not only as learners, but also as responsible citizens of the 21st century,

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4.4 Creating & Using Rubrics for PBL Assessment

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4.4 Creating & Using Rubrics for PBL Assessment