Student Projects that are Impacting Our World

Project-based learning motivates students to define problems in the world and find solutions when they see purpose and relevance to their work. Students will work for weeks at a time to find a solution to a problem to which they are committed. Here are three student projects arising out of class time dedicated to empowering students to make a difference in the world.

Students Make a Prosthetic Leg for a Duck, Showing the Value of Purpose in Learning

  Photo Credit

A woman found a duck that had it's leg chewed off by a turtle. She searched the Internet looking for a prosthetic leg for a duck. A group of middle school students in this small Arkansas town in Arkansas worked all semester to create a prosthesis for the duck using a 3D printer. They researched the Indian Runner Duck to find out how it bent it's leg to walk. After creating and revising 36 prototypes these three students attached the prosthetic leg to Peg the duck and watched him walk and even run! They documented their process using pictures and video.
http://www.kait8.com/clip/14024822/duck-gets-prosthetic-leg

                                                                                                                         

Sleeping Bag that Turns into Tent Could Help Homeless People this Winter
Groups of students at Carnegie Mellon's Integrated Innovation Institute participated in an "Impact-A-Thon" to create innovative and affordable solutions to help homeless people survive in cold weather. One team created an insulated sleeping bag that expands into a tent. They determined that it needed to be portable and durable so they fitted it with both wheels for pulling and straps for carrying.

Photo Credit

                                                                   
How Students' Project Honors Suburban Heroes at Pearl Harbor and Beyond
During a discussion about the Vietnam War, students at Rotolo Middle School became interested in the people from their county who died serving our country in wars. These 8th graders decided to research the stories of "the soldier behind the name."  They went beyond the Vietnam war to include the Spanish American War, World Wars I and II, Cold War, Vietnam, Korea, and Persian Gulf. They visited cemeteries, read newspaper articles and yearbooks, consulted maps, drew sketches, coded to create the website, took pictures and videos to create a virtual memorial.  Do take a few minutes to visit their virtual memorial and celebrate the war heroes of Kane County. The project continues as more than 200 students have added information to keep it current. Their teacher notes that it is truly the students' project, she just asked "What if..." 

How can you spur your students to make a difference in our world today? "What if....." Let us know what your students decide to do!

Genius Hour: Consider Dedicating 20% of Class Time for Student-Choice Exploration

It's a new year! Classes are soon beginning in 2018. What will you do to empower your students to learn and make a difference in the world this year? I recently came across an inspirational video where students shared the projects they developed in Genius Hour. Not only did their projects motivate these students to research and share their learning, they made a difference in people's lives as they informed others about topics they felt strongly about. Take a look and see what you think!

                                           YouTube Credit #20Time projects in 4 minutes 

So how did these students accomplish so much using one hour of class time per week? It all began in the 1950's when 3M started a 15% Project. You may have heard the story of how Post-Its and masking tape evolved from this project. What initially looked like a failed experiment to create a very strong adhesive for the aerospace industry in 1968 turned out to be a very weak pressure-sensitive adhesive. It took multiple people experimenting with the adhesive over a period of nearly 10 years before 3M came up with the decision to market and sell the product in 1977.

To encourage and inspire innovation, Google asked employees to spend 20% of their time at work on a project of interest to them. Some of the products that have arisen from this effort include Gmail, AdSense, Google News, and Google Teacher Academy. "Using 20 Time in the workplace allows innovative ideas and projects to flourish and/or fail without the bureaucracy of committees and budgets." 20-Time in Education Inspire. Create. Innovate.

These business initiatives have now been applied to education to to a empower students to inspire, create, and innovate. MindShift offers some great suggestions to get you started with Genius Hour in your classroom this year. Sean Crevier has seen his students experience great success. He suggests breaking the project into three parts: the problem, the solution, and the product. Each student defines the problem he/she wants to investigate that can be completed within the allotted time frame (he uses 10 weeks). He meets with students individually and has them complete a diagram beginning with the due date and planning backwards to create their own timeline for the project. Students are responsible for keeping themselves on track using a Google Spreadsheet and reflecting after each period. He realizes that "it's all about the journey" and the problem-solving students do in the process. The product may not turn out as students initially thought (like the Post-Its) but it may be even more useful.

I encourage you to give this process a try! Genius Hour works in elementary schools too. Edutopia suggests setting it up providing Time, Reflection, Collaboration, and Sharing opportunities for students to work on topics important to their community. A great example of Genius Hour in action in middle schools can be found in Jen Schneider's work "How to Build Community Leaders of Today - and Tomorrow - Through Student Genius Hours." Challenge your students to innovate to better our world this year!