Wednesday, August 22, 2012

PBL Ideas Come Home

My son came home the other day and was actually talking about his school day! I was shocked because he is typically a quiet kid, and since we moved here 6 months ago it’s been hard for him. He is a different kid and likes to draw and read comic books, so when he started telling me and showing me his new class, I was excited. It was all about graphic novels, and how to put them together from story board to publishing. I thought the syllabus of the course plan looked great, it is designed to teach a multitude of things throughout the 10 week course. Very engaging for students and fun for teachers to present I would imagine. I grabbed some of his work for the class and saw it was from a company called Go Teach Go. I did some of my own research and saw that they do indeed have quite a few complete project based study courses available for only $30! I literally laughed out loud, I wanted to purchase one called Drawing The Line – Global Theme Park Design for myself and my son to do together. It looked really fun to research and design an actual theme park (which I love) with my son as a project together, I mean for $30 who can go wrong? All in all this was the best thing to happen to him in this school, and in his schooling in general, in a long time. I am very pleased to see that teachers are still thinking outside the box when it comes to courses and the plans they teach. I’ll be waiting to see the outcome of their final project when it is done, before they present it to the community (that is the final course ending) which will be a great experience for him.

Ideas and Activities For My Class

I had recently heard about a couple different Project Based Learning Units from a teachers gathering. One in particular that stood out to me was www.goteachgo.com. This website offers 100% 30 day money back guarantee, and all their programs are only thirty dollars. And the value you get from these “Complete” projects in a box is worth well over the selling price. Some of the other companies that offer the same type of programs and lessons, don’t offer the type of quality that Go Teach Go does. With the other companies plans you had to do a lot of the leg work and research yourself which left me tired and drained at night. Go tech go has everything you need for your students to get going and for you to teach the action lesson plans right out of the box. These project units are so fun and intriguing that I’ve had some parents wanting to find out if they can follow along, or buy one themselves. These unit project lessons will teach a variety of real life skills and knowledge that children need to know in today’s world. Some of the project plans are: Drawing The Line – Theme Park Design, HeadBanger Nation – Youth Concussion Awareness, Comic-Con – Designing and Producing comics, and many more to choose from. The grades for the project learning units are from grades 4-10, and really teach critical thinking and problem solving that we as adults need to know to succeed. These are really great packages, and have been engaging my students for weeks now. They get in groups and work through the assignments daily, and in the end the course final is to take it to the community to show their projects. Great system, great buy everything you need to take your classroom, like I did, to the next level.