The students will focus on many 21st century skills. The three that will be focused on the most in this PBL unit are critical thinking, collaboration and communication.
Critical thinking – The students will be using their critical thinking skills in many ways throughout this project. The students will have to be able to gather reliable information from the internet, an expert, etc. Then they will have to figure out how to use this information in order to successfully accomplish the given task. In order to be successful, the students will have to incorporate many different subject areas such as math, biology and English.
Collaboration – The students will be working in groups to complete this project. Also, the students will be coming together as a class throughout the span of the project to see what their peers are doing as well.
Communication – This project will have an emphasis on communication since they will be working in groups and must be able to successfully do so. The student will showcase their verbal communication skills through the presentation of their final recommendations to the school board and community.
Critical thinking – The students will be using their critical thinking skills in many ways throughout this project. The students will have to be able to gather reliable information from the internet, an expert, etc. Then they will have to figure out how to use this information in order to successfully accomplish the given task. In order to be successful, the students will have to incorporate many different subject areas such as math, biology and English.
- In the Lemonade Mix Activity, students will be deciding the procedure for determining the "best" mixture of sugar, water and lemon juice. They will be given some guidance to discuss with other groups what this optimization represents and why they selected this particular mixture, which unifies these critical thinking skills.
- In the Candle Lab students may need to research the composition of the candles and make connections between the rate at which the candle burns and its composition.
- Students will be using critical thinking in the main project of answering the driving question because they will need to decide the important components to address in their write-up and make a fully supported recommendation. This will require students to form an opinion from research and critique that of others in the gallery walks of other group data and the QA sessions in the final presentations.
Collaboration – The students will be working in groups to complete this project. Also, the students will be coming together as a class throughout the span of the project to see what their peers are doing as well.
- All of the activities as well as the entry event will allow students to work in small groups of 2 - 7 people, and students will be working with different sets of students. In these activities, students will often be given specific roles within their group, which means that student is responsible for that aspect of the activity. For example, in the Candle Lab there will be 1 student responsible for finding the mass of the candle, 1 student responsible for recording the data, and 1 student responsible for timing and student safety. This allows students to feel responsibility within their small group.
- Within the main project students will need to create one write-up and one final presentation within their group. It will be necessary for all of the students to speak during their presentation, which means that all students must contribute to the end product and have an understanding of the work that will allow them to discuss it. This forces students to work together with all members of their group because any one member can be held accountable for the information presented.
Communication – This project will have an emphasis on communication since they will be working in groups and must be able to successfully do so. The student will showcase their verbal communication skills through the presentation of their final recommendations to the school board and community.
- All of the activities as well as the entry event contain a component of communication, where students must share with the rest of the class their end result, sometimes in the form of a graph, a calculation, or a glass of the "best" lemonade. This will help students begin to become comfortable with discussion and communicating their individual work.
- Students will have communication of their progress through daily exit tickets, which will be emphasized as a means to communicate their difficulties and successes. It will show students that they may only receive the support they need if they are able to adequately articulate it to their group members and/or to the instructor.
- The culminating presentation will allow students to focus primarily on verbal communication and critique. When the students present their recommendations to the class, they will also be discussing questions prompted from other classmates, which creates active communication (as opposed to memorized speech). As stated before, all students will be required to speak within the final presentation which allows the instructor to see the development of this 21st century skill.