4. Digitally Supported Project-Based Learning

Start with a Question
This is a critical element of the project. A poor topic or focus question will lead to projects that may be of less educational value. Pick or help your students develop questions and topics that are truly relevant to their lives and that will allow wealth of deep exploration. Once a topic has been selected you may want to construct a KWL or a knowledge webs that will provide participants with a context for the upcoming explorations.

Facilitator Key - Guiding participants to the selection and development of an appropriate and engaging focus question(s)

Strategize a Plan of Action
Work with project participants to develop a means for examining the question or topic by doing the following:
Agree on project goals and specific outcomjes
Structure a time frame for the project.
Brainstorm about resources should be investigated, what sources of information could be explored, what tools could be used.
Determine if and how participants may be grouped
Review different means for structuring the data and documentation
Discuss any issues of protocol or safety
Discuss how the project will be assessed and possibly develop a rubric

Facilitator Key - Making sure that everyone feels engaged in the investigation, has a sense of the structure including time frame and expected outcomes, and is aware of their role in the project.

Search for Information/Data
Participants begin their explorations and data gathering. It is important that this work is documented for later structure and analysis. Suggested data include:
- photographs, sketches, and notes
- URLs of relevant websites
- real objects
- work with experts in the community
- movies, interviews, Quicktime VR
- books and CD ROM's

Facilitator Keys - Scaffolding student explorations, assisting in the selection of resources, suggesting and providing digital tools, helping to focus student work. Encouraging student documentation throughout the project will be helpful as the project moves forward. You might want to utilize a bulletin board or other means of fostering communication if participants are working in different locations.

Structure What You Have Found
Critical to subsequent synthesis of the findings will be the need for students to have an organized structure to the data and documentation. As they explore, observe, and collect information, it will be useful if they have developed a means to record their efforts. Sometimes it can be useful for students to take turns being data recorder/photographer/URL archivist. Many times it is useful for all participants in a group to record ongoing observations for later comparisons of notes. This element may be ongoing and iterative even during the search process.

Facilitator Keys - Providing the means and space to organize digital and physical information can be a challenge (especially if there is limited hard drive space of other digital media). Helping students focus on relevant information takes great skill in knowing when to scaffold, and how to support student efforts.

Synthesize Your Findings
This is the element of the project where the students are challenged to examine the work that they have done, and the information that they have organized, and to think in new about creative ways about their work. Utilizing digital video applications (such as iMovie), slide shows, websites, and physical artifacts to support the ideas that they would like to represent. Using original music can also be a great addition (Garageband). Students should think about who the audience will be who will view their project presentations.

Facilitator Keys - Students should be encouraged to go beyond a perfunctory retelling of what they have found and to use higher order thinking skills to create interesting representations of their understanding and affect.

Share your Insights
Sharing in a celebration of the individual and collective learning stories can be the high point of the project. Bringing together the digital and physical artifacts to share as exhibits will make for an engaging multimedia presentation. Allow the student to reflect on the totality of the project as you bring it to closure. Bring out original KWLs and webs as a bookend to the work.

Facilitator Keys - Allotting enough time so that presenters do not feel rushed and that there are times for questions. It is nice to invite individuals from the community who might have participated.