The key to Schooling FOR the Future- Projects

All these talk about preparing students to be well equipped for the 21st Century. What are the distinguishing attributes of their program that separate them from the rest of the world?

Project Management—A 21st Century Skill
KaosPilot International
International School of New Business Design and Social Innovation -Training entrepreneurs and project leaders with a creative edge and a global mind.


http://www.odemagazine.com/doc/27/most_unusual_college_in_the_world

Their incredible Tibet Project that has a documentary produced on it. http://www.tibet.net/en/flash/2003/1103/261103_1.html

Their website with their big projects http://www.kaospilot.dk/docs/HotProjects.asp

Some thoughts: Although Kaospilot is really one of its kind, in general, the Danish education system and the philosophy of teaching does provide foundations for development of creative minds in people. The focus of education is on problem-solving, emphasizing on analysis and application. Diversity that comes with not banding pupils according to abilities builds acceptance that there will always be different ways that people learn and relate, and allows for people to bring ‘different things’ to the table.

New Tech Foundation
Extracted from: http://www.newtechfoundation.org/press_articles.html

December 2007 Real Projects in a Digital World, Principal Leadership Magazine
By Suzie Boss & Jane Krauss

Managing a complex project is the stuff of real work. In the business world, a good project manager is a master communicator, an efficient time manager, a careful budgeter, and a
tireless troubleshooter. These skills can be applied to the world of teaching and learning, too. Few teachers have received formal training in project management.... help teachers think about the tools and strategies they can use with students for managing time, collaborating with team members, and assessing progress.

For example, teachers will need to:

• Communicate with students and others about the project
  
• Make milestones and events visible and notify students of changes
  
• Get resources to students


• Assess student work from many angles and give just-in-time


• Feedback on student work as it develops, not just when it’s completed.
  

Students will need to:

• Manage their time and flow of work


• Manage materials and control work drafts


• Collaborate with team members and experts
  
• Get and use feedback on their work (through self-reflection, team input, and teacher advice)


• Work iteratively and see how parts add up to the whole.

Some thoughts: In the face of NCLB in US, the opportunity to bring forward different school models help to free up the public school system to raise quality. A visit last March to San Francisco allowed me to see how New Tech Foundation transformed schools through the pervasive practice of Problem-based learning. An honored opportunity to meet Bob Pearlman, Director of Strategic Planning and his team showed us that technology could be a very powerful way to drive learning as students articulate the problems posed by teams of teachers, using internet to gather their information and synthesize their learning in a truly authentic manner. The foundation's philosphy is anchored on making the 21st centuries literacies embedded and enlivened in their curriculum design.

For more info on Bob and the New Technology Foundation and the schools: http://www.bobpearlman.org/

In Singapore, the papers highlighted an interesting project that was shared during the 10th Hwa Chung Institution's Students’ Research Symposium commended by SMS Lui for their creativity. The team had conducted surveys, organised other secondary school students to watch the movie "A beautiful mind", as well as produced their own musical, to educate students on the history, research and symptoms of mental illness, culminated into a handbook distributed to almost 300 students.

CNA Online noted SMS Lui commented that R&D was a driver for economic growth and a strong pillar for our long-term competitiveness. To succeed, we(Singapore) needed to attract and grow a sizeable crop of research talent that would enable us to sustain a critical mass of advanced research activity over the long term. He added that we could not wait til the university level to interest our youths in research and innovation. Thus, a need to start them young and allow them to experience the thrill and excitement of being part of a team that was involved in carrying out research that was deeply meaningful and truly significant.

Report noted SMS Lui as saying that it was not hard to conduct research for a project, but by incorporating the topic into reality, it was able to bring about changes.

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/343879/1/.html(Posted: 26 April 2008)

A possible flipside to making Mathematical problems too problematic???

Students ‘learn better with symbols’ (Straits Times, 26/4, P48)
Report, taken off Reuters and New York Times, on a research conducted in the United States on maths teaching methods.

Report noted researchers’ argument that maths concepts taught in abstract symbols and various formulae registered better than when students were taught with real-world examples. The research also found that students who first learnt maths concepts using abstract symbols were better able to transfer that learning to other problems when tested. Report also noted that adding extraneous details in story problems made it hard for students to extract basic mathematical concepts and apply them to new problems.

Report additionally noted that the findings cast doubt on the widely used practice of using concrete examples to teach abstract maths concepts, although some mathematicians warned against over-generalising the findings.

Even Standard has an adapted version of PBL- Its called P5BL. http://pbl.stanford.edu/index.html