My PLN just made my school a better place:
One of the latest project-based challenges we faced in our grade 8 & 9 classroom was designing and constructing a safe and beautiful stage set for our (public) school's (k to 9) younger students holiday concert. Made helpful by both our district and province mandating 'competency focussed learning ' and made into reality through developing an effective PLN. Right: One of the Grade 8 groups developing prototypes to answer the challenge: "With the area of 5 sheets of plywood, you must create a set that has 4 houses and can safely hold students 'on top of them'" I jumped at the opportunity when our school's music teacher asked our staff team for some help, I knew it was risky putting students in charge of a project that not only the entire school and staff would see, countless parents would as well. The doubts were many: Would the students fail to take ownership of this ? Was the task too advanced for the age group to create something l...