Library Resources: Reimagine Teaching Library Resource Guide: Project Based Learning

What Is Project-Based Learning?

Project-based learning (PBL) in the 21st century involves much more than merely planning a class project. In fact, projects have always been a component of many units of instruction in traditional teaching. In contrast, proponents of PBL today argue that true project-based learning involves basing all of the instruction on team or individual student activities that are student-selected, real-world projects, independent of instructional unit planning or individual whole-group lesson plans that drive the curriculum.

from:
Bender, William N. 20 Strategies for Increasing Student Engagement. Learning Sciences International, 2017.

eBook Resources

20 Strategies for Increasing Student Engagement
This book covers both flipping the classroom and project-based learning strategies, giving specific examples of each.
A Companion To Interdisciplinary Stem Project-Based Learning : For Educators by Educators
This text contains 25 Project-Based Learning (PBL) lessons written by a combination of undergraduate preservice teachers, inservice teachers, and graduate students. Everyone who wrote a chapter strives to improve STEM education to help others implement standards-based STEM instruction that takes learning in isolation to greater accountability through integrated and meaningful tasks that answer the question every teacher dreads: When am I going to use this?
Project Management for Education : The Bridge to 21st Century Learning by Bernie Trilling; Walter Ginevri
In Project Management for Education: The Bridge to 21st Century Learning, authors Bernie Trilling and Walter Ginevri provide a “two-in-one” guide for educators and project management professionals, demonstrating how the two fields can work together. By teaming up to enrich the experience of students, both educators and project management professionals can continue to develop their own skills and better meet the challenges they face in our ever-changing world.

Scholarly Articles

Peer Evaluation in Blended Team Project-Based Learning: What Do Students Find Important? (Journal of Educational Technology & Society, 15(4),2012)
This article describes what students find important when evaluating team peers in project based learning.
Project-Based Learning in Post-Secondary Education: Theory, Practice and Rubber Slingshots
The purpose of the study was to explore what project-based learning is, what are the pedagogical or psychological motives supporting it, how it has been implemented and what impact it has had on learning in post-secondary education.
Revisiting the Effects of Project-Based Learning on Students’ Academic Achievement (Educational Research Review), 2019
This meta-analysis investigates the impact of project based learning on student achievement.

Web Resources

Assessing Project Based Learning (Buck Institute video)
This 5:02 minute video focuses on methods of assessing student learning in project based teaching.
Project Based Learning from Students' Perspective (Buck Institute, video)
This video provides student feedback on their project based learning experiences (3:59 minutes).
Research Spotlight on Project Based Learning
Basic resources from the National Education Association.
Seven Essentials for Project-Based Learning
Examples of effective project-based learning from the ASCD (formerly the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development,) a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that represents more than 114,000 educators from more than 127 countries, including 67 affiliate organizations.
What Does Project-Based Learning Look Like?
This web page from Sam Houston State University addresses the significant components of PBL, such as content, collaboration, communication, and more.

Videos

School of the Future
The Workshop School, a small Philadelphia school serving kids from some of the city’s toughest neighborhoods, builds its curriculum around projects that engage students in solving real-world problems.