PBL Debrief

Debriefing the PBL

Post-project debriefing is important to students, teachers and the PBL as a whole. Students, teachers, administration, parents, and community members would all be involved in the debrief. Reflecting on the project after it is complete will help the students to look back on the entire process and recognize aspects of the process that could have been done in a different way. Involving other teachers, administration and community members will help gain support and generate excitement for the use of PBLs in the classroom. As stated in an Edutopia article titled Why Teach with Project-Based Learning?: Providing Students With a Well-Rounded Classroom Experience, "Project-based learning helps students apply what they learn to real-life experiences and provides an all-around enriching education." (1)

Students
Students will fill out a debrief form (2) after the culminating event. The information gained from the student debrief will give insight into what students had learned, whether they liked the format of the PBL, and any improvements that they'd like to see. This information can help the teacher assess the success of the PBL in meeting the curricular goals and supply ideas for updating and improving the PBL.

Teachers
Feedback from co-workers about the process and the final product would help to refine and improve the curricular aspect of the project and provide suggestions for improvement. Getting the other teachers in the building involved would also increase the school's interest in PBLs and motivate them to become more involved in the next one. Teacher debrief would be done through a Google Form or Google Doc and through discussion groups.

Administrators
Involving administrators in the PBL process will help to familiarize them with the process and the benefits of teaching through real-life projects. Having administrators participate in the debrief will give the teacher an idea as to whether the administrators felt the PBL project was successful and if they are likely to support future projects. Their input and suggestions will help teachers to understand where they stand and what more needs to be done in order to gain the support necessary to continue to incorporate PBL projects into the curriculum.

Community Members
Incorporating PBLs into the curriculum is such a drastic change from traditional classroom teaching, that involving the community in the process as much as possible will be help the community to understand the benefits to the childrens' learning. It will help them to understand the benefits of using PBLs in order to build life-long learning skills, skills that will be necessary for the 21st century world that the students are entering into. Including the community in the debrief will provide teachers with insight into how the community feels about the students' work.

Including these key players in the PBL debriefing process will provide a lot of important information to the teachers and students. If the debrief was meant to be a one-time assessment it wouldn't be worth doing. The information obtained from each of the groups will be presented to and discussed with the students in order to determine what the next steps will be. In the Backyard Nature PBL, if there are ways that the students can improve the work that they did on the trail, the changes will be made. If there are changes that need to be made to the PBL design, those changes will also be made in order to improve the project. There are so many aspects involved in a PBL, from the planning, preparing, briefing, and actually doing the work, that any input and ideas should be used to improve the process and products.

Work Cited: 

1. (2008). Why Teach with Project-Based Learning?: Providing Students - Edutopia. Retrieved June 8, 2016, from http://www.edutopia.org/project-learning-introduction.
2. Debrief form -Adapted from PAKEYS.org