For those of you playing the home game (I’m looking at you mom and Debbie), you’ve noticed my posts this month have been a bit fractured in their, well, posting.
While I’m certainly no slave to the rules, it is driving me slightly batty that I’m not able to get something up every day.
It turns out not having a wireless connection everywhere I go out here restricts my ability to post.
The whole inconsistency of access has started to frustrate me.
It’s what caused my brain to flag this tweet from @kealyd when it rolled through my feed the other day:
#eduphilosophy affirmation day 4 projects for projects’ sake are not PBL
I think they actually might be.
I’ve got no end game in mind once I document 365 TIK. The whole decision to begin this project was made in a matter of seconds and prompted by the fact that Ben would soon be finished with his 365 Questions Google Can’t Answer.
It seemed to me like someone should keep up the mantle just for the sake of doing it.
We call projects for the sake of projects play in children and hobbies in adults.
I see nothing wrong in giving students time to read in class or unguided time to write. I see many things right in it.
What I think might be a more perfect statement is that not all PBL learning should be projects for the sake of projects.
I sit and write this post for me and the sake of some self-imposed goal. Later today, I’ll be building a podcast delivery system, writing a newsletter and prepping for a conference call. Each of those projects come with ends in mind. I’ll know where I want to go before I get there and the route will be straightforward.
In this space and in this moment, I’m playing with ideas toward the end of having played with ideas.
While Lewis and Clark had an overall goal to their expedition, they didn’t wake each morning to write their learning objectives on the board or else consider themselves failures. No, they were explorers.
January 1, I didn’t write down a list that said somewhere, “Refine your thinking on project-based learning.” But here it happened. As a learner I know when I am learning with purpose and when I am learning for the joy of learning alone.
Allowing the breathing room for crazy random happenstance means I feel better equipped to move toward objectives when the time comes.