A Tale of Two Projects: What is project-based learning, anyway?

Imagine a process that could give your homeschool just the right amount of structure. That could inject both fun and meaningful hard work into subjects you were studying anyway. That could seamlessly incorporate your kids' natural interests and strengths and lead to self-discovery. That provides opportunities to learn soft skills like leadership, communication, and giving and receiving feedback. That prepare kids for the real world and real jobs.

Who doesn't want that?! 

Now there is a big difference between "doing a project" and "project-based learning." Often project-based learning gets confused with unit studies, or just doing a project at the end of a unit. Most of us are familiar with a unit study - you learn all about the Renaissance, or simple machines, using a collection of activities along the way, maybe summing it up with a big project at the end. 

Most of us did these "end-of-unit" projects in school growing up. They were fun, but also felt kind of like another formality, or a reward for "getting through" all the other learning. 

Project-based learning (PBL) flips that on its head. Instead of putting that project at the end of the learning, it starts with that project idea, providing instant motivation for the rest of the learning to happen (and more!). All the learning then happens through the lens of that big project. 

For example, let's imagine you want to do a unit about weather. Instead of learning all about clouds, air movements, and how tornadoes form, and THEN creating a weather station, imagine announcing, “We are going to create our own weather news show to send to our cousins across the country! What do we need to know in order to do that?”

How exciting would that be?!

You will still learn about clouds, air movements and tornadoes, but you would probably need to go even deeper, learning to read weather maps and your instruments, how to talk into a camera, maybe even how a green screen works! There would be teamwork (creating a weather news show is a team effort!), and there would be a real audience (in this case your cousins). 

All of this combines to create a lot of engagement! Kids will care about truly learning the material (Aunt Kim will be watching!) and their craftsmanship will miraculously improve - you see kids suddenly care about spelling and punctuation who never willingly used a capital letter in their life before! (seriously, though, what is it with homeschoolers and capitals?? Is it that much more effort to write a big "A?")

PBL is the secret sauce that can bring balance to any style of homeschooling: if you unschool, it can add that little bit of motivation to do hard things that kids typically avoid, and some structure and reason for building "habits" (writing practice, math, etc). If you use classical or Charlotte Mason, it gives some of the modern, real-world experiences that can really bring to life the powerful classical themes you are immersed in. Any way you school, it builds connection and community (since collaboration is so often a part of it), and can provide some amazing resume-building opportunities! 

How does it work? Well, my friend, that is what we are here for! Kelly and I feel like PBL is for EVERY homeschooler and we'd love it to be talked about and shared far and wide! It's exactly what so many people are looking for, right under our noses and it deserves to become a more common homeschooling option. We have been using it in our homes and co-ops for years and have learned so many skills and tips for making it successful and natural, and we are working hard to share them! Things like

• How to choose a winning project
• The project blueprint - a structure for success
• How to be a mentor (YOU are really the secret sauce - there is no curriculum, but you can make or break it as a mentor!)
• How to turn your kids' interests into deep learning 

For starters, we always offer our Project-based Homeschooling Basics course - the full introduction to PBL that will walk you through the steps and skills to get you started right now. And sign up for our email list to be alerted to any new workshops or posts! :) 

Happy homeschooling! 

- Danika