Meet seveninternational

educators who havefound success with

project learning.By Jennifer Prescott

The scene, at first glance,resembles an exception-ally colorful science fair.Robotic constructionsfrom the Philippineswhir and gyrate as theydemonstrate the concepts of Newton'slaws of motion, a group of first gradersin France light up Twitter with their

Inspired Teaclanguage practice, andin a ghastlybut effective display of the mechan-ics of decompositiona pig's heart,swarmed by maggots, decays in afast-motion forensics video. The roomhums with a host of foreign accents.

Last November, more than 700school leaders, educators, and report-ers gathered in Washington, D.C, to

celebrate the promise of innovativeteaching and project learning tochange our global future. The eventwas the Microsoft Partners in LearningGlobal Forum, and its purpose was foreducators worldwide to connect, learn,and collaborate on some of the mostexciting innovations in education, par-ticularly in the use of technology. Now

34 SCHOLASTIC INSTRUCTOR SPRING 2012

hers, Inspired Ideasin its eighth year, the conference previously held in South Africa, Brazil,and Hong Kong, among other coun-triesoffers nearly 200 educators from70 countries the chance to win one of18 Global Forum Educator Awards. Inmany cases, the teachers who come tothe forum have never left their homecountry before, have never stepped out

of their villages, have never gotten onan airplane.

The result is "an amazing globalcommunity of teachers," says AnthonySalcito, vice president of education forMicrosoft. "Many of these teachers feelthat they're different. They're the onestrying new things and pushing theboundaries. They're true innovators."

From a virtual travel agency to aschool-based music studio to a real-world advertising pitch, the ideaswe highlight, from seven amazingteachers, represent inspired teachingat its best. We also suggest ways youcan bring innovation to your ownclassroom. Getting started with projectlearning is easier than you think!

INSPIRED IDEAS

MariuaHussein,

MAKINGMOVIESFROMPRISONchallenging imprisonedgirls to create and filmvideos on a topic theycare about.

Sandra CaldasSaragoca,Brazil

\

"I teach in a school in Rio de Janeiro that is inside a prison for youngfemales, some as young as twelve years old," Sandra Caldas Saragocaexplains. "They are poor; they don't have family. The prison is their reality."

Saragoca wanted her students to feel like they had something tocontribute. First she invited them to choose a topic they were passion-ate about, from preventing pollution to the influence of African wordson Brazilian culture to effective gardening techniques. Saragoca thenchallenged the girls to create educational scenes about their topics usingconstruction toys. Finally, the students learned how to film and edit theirprojects using Microsoft's MovieMaker software.

"We teach them how to make animated films," Saragoca says, "and thenthose films are shown outside the prison. In that moment, they feel thatthey can do something good. The people who are watching these filmsknow they can do something good, too."

Although the young women she teaches might be considered powerless,Saragoca's message to them is that their voices matter and that they canbe agents of change in their own education, and in the world. "They learn,and then they teach," she says.TRY IT Every kid feels like there are times when he or she doesn't have avoice. Try inviting your students to make a video about a topic that intereststhem or that is part of your curriculum. Have them become the experts.Share the videos online to make the biggest impact.

'Their films are shown outside the prison and.they/eel that they can do something good."

FINDINGAPOLITIGAL VOIGETeaching civic responsibility andhelping kids find ways that theycan help their country,Marwa Hussein, a teacher at theEl Raml Prep School for Girls inAlexandria, Egypt, was understandablymoved by the revolution that over-threw her country's oppressive regimelast winter. "Each citizen is responsiblefor Egypt's revival," she explains. "Eventhose who are still in school."

In the aftermath of the revolution,Hussein asked her students to brain-storm what they could do for Egypteven though they weren't of voting age.Through a Facebook page and YouTubechannel (EgyptianLessThanl8), theylaunched a social media campaigncalling for the elimination of negativeattitudes, which they felt were pre-venting social growth.

Integrating skills in social studies,language arts, music, and mathemat-ics, the project included inspirationalstudent-made videos, complete withEnglish and French subtitles. The

videos, which are set to music, encour-age youth to look toward a future theyhave the power to shape.

"Teens have such creative energy,"says Hussein. "How can that help servethe country and move it forward?"TRY IT Use the upcoming presidentialelection to discuss the issues that areimportant to students, and brainstormways they can effect change. ShowHussein's videos as inspiration!

36 SCHOLASTIC INSTRUCTOR SPRING 2012

INSPIRED IDEAS

GarethRitter,Wales

LEARNING FROMSOUND ANDRHYTHM

Blending music and tech-nology to hook even themost reluctant earners.

Many of Gareth Ritter's stu-dents at Willows High Schoolin Gardiff, Wales, live in dif-ficult environments. They areturned off by school but they

love music. So Ritter had the bright idea to challengestudents to compose their own original tracks and thencreate tutorials for recording various sounds, includingguitars, drums, and vocals, Ritter posted the tutorials onYouTube, where they received a surprising 27,000 hits,"My students' videos were used worldwide," he says,

Ritter also brought to the project an adaptation ofKinect for Xbox 360a gaming system that allows kidsto use their bodies, rather than a mouse or a controller,to manipulate the screen. This tangible style of learninghelps reach kids with learning disabilities, who respondto the immersive sensation of being "part" of the lessonat hand, "That's bringing the outside stuff from home,which they love, into the classroom," explains Ritter,who used Kinect to test what students had learned inthe process of recording sound sources. One hundredpercent of the students passed the exam.

In what Ritter calls "a massive success story formy pupils," a group of his students who learned theirrecording craft through the project were eventuallysigned with a U,K, record label, Ritter gives praise whereit's due: "It's not really what I've done. It's about them.Without them, the project would be nothing,"

"That's bringing the outside stufffrom home, which they love, intothe classroom"

TRY IT How can you use technologyand kids' ownintereststo engage students with the curriculum?Ritter's project began as a tutorial, so you might havestudents write or film instructions for beating a chal-lenging video game, conducting online research, ordesigning a mobile app. Let students' questions, hob-bies, and pursuits outside of school lead the way.

Tessa vanZadelho//,Netherlands

PLANNINGINTERNATIONALADVENTURESTeaching geography through a uirtualtravel agency where students research,plan, and share aduice.

Award-winningteacher Tessa vanZadelhoff left thetextbooks on theshelves when itcame time to teachher students inEindhoven, TheNetherlands, aboutgeography. Instead,she had her 10-year-olds open a travelagency that oper-ated from the class-roomone in whichthey researched realtrips for friends andrelatives.

The Bear TravelAgency usedTwitter and a blogto dispense traveladvice. Students cal-culated costs usingMicrosoft Excel and

created digital tourist guides, videos, storybooks,and translation booklets. In the process, theylearned about European geography and created avital service that, it could be argued, is worth goodmoney.

The kids also figuratively took to the streets toadd more value for their "customers," "We madevideos in front of the interactive whiteboard whilewe were 'walking' through the city, using Bingmaps' streetside view," says van Zadelhoff, Onestudent navigated through the map, while a secondnarrated travel tips, and a third operated the videocamera,TRY IT How can you bring your curriculum into thereal world? Gan your math class consult on taxprep? Gan students write a brochure for a localtourist spot? When kids realize that their effortscan impact others, they become teachers and inno-vators in their own right.

38 SCHOLASTIC INSTRUCTOR SPRING 2 0 1 2

INSPIRED IDEASKara Barfeer-Astrom andRoger Lister,

Sweden

COMPETING WITHREAL-WORLD EXECSMaking a pitch to a London advertis-ing firm to design an app promotingOlympic sponsors.

After hearing executives at a dinner partybemoan their new hires' lack of skills, JenniferKing asked her students at Strode's Gollege inSurrey, England: "Do you want to put our cur-riculum on hold for a little bit and learn someskills that you'll eventually need to know in theworkplace?" The students agreed,

"I didn't want to fabricate it and make a fakecorporation," explains King, So she approachedadvertising agency Ogilvy, and convinced thehead of digital technologies in London to giveher students a chance to pitch a campaign.

The creative brief asked for a mobile phoneapplication to promote the sponsors of the 2012Olympics, Once a week for six weeks, studentsabandoned their structured lessons and "wentto work" for a full six-hour day. In small teams,they generated ideas, gave one another feed-back, and produced a pitch. Simultaneously,creative teams at Ogilvy were addressing thesame challenge. King's students had to learnorganically how to manage their "workday"and follow procedures similar to those of theirprofessional colleagues.

When the project was finished, the classwent to London, presented their ideas to Ogilvy,and reflected on the feedback they received,

"We're now waiting to see if a bit of one ofthe projects is going to be included in the finalappthat would be truly amazing," says King,TRY IT Don't be afraid to reach out to companiesand organizations that can give your lessonsreal-world grounding. You might be surprisedby the partnerships you can develop!

MOREGLOBALLEARNINGFurther opportunitiesthat offer the chanceto connect withteachers and kidsaround the world.

The Imagine CupThis global technologycompetition (finals willbeheld in Australiain July 2012) asksstudents to "imaginea world where technol-ogy solves the toughestproblems," Studentparticipants also getsupport in turning theirIdeas into businesses.imaginecup.com

ShoutThis worldwide programis designed to help edu-cators and students usetechnology to addressglobal environmentalissues. This year's focuswill be on improvingglobal drinking wateraccess and quality,shoutlearning.org

Partners inLearning NetworkThe sponsor of thePartners in LearningGlobal Forum,Microsoft's networkfor educators offersa wealth of resourcesfor using technology inthe classroom as wellas for connecting withteachers around theglobe. Don't miss the"Teacher's Guide forFree Tools,"pil-network.com

BECOMINGEORENSIC

SCIENTISTSGetting kids interested in

science with a high-interest,straight-/rom-TV approach..

"Our students weren't gravitatingto science or math as much as wehoped, so we wanted to developsomething that would get thementhusiastic and curious," says KaraBarker-Astrom, She and colleagueRoger Lister landed on a projectnot for the weak of stomach: To getreal forensics experience, studentslearned how different conditionsaffect decomposition of organicmatter. They left one pig heartoutside in the elements, and theother in the school attic under awebcam. Students found that the

heart outside vanished completelydevoured by a host of insects thatcould manage to ingest the chewierpartswhile the heart in the atticshifted and morphed, becoming astough as leather,

"The students stitched thattogether into a movie to show whathappened and how [the hearts]decomposed," Barker-Astromexplains. Of their own volition,"the kids stayed late on a Friday tocomplete this," she adds, with anexpression of pleased disbelief,TRY IT Forensic science kits arewidely available from companieslike MindWare and Delta Education,Try one as a way to get started onscience for the intrepid, D

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