Approaches to Learning

As you complete the Personal Project, you are asked to consider the skills you’re developing. As a part of your report, you have to provide evidence of some of the skills you have developed as a result of your work on the Personal Project. This is what you're assessed on in connection to this stage of the project (see Workbook page or link full rubric).

You might be thinking: why is this such a big part of the project? Here’s what you should remember: the project is about you working towards a learning goal by creating a product--all of which is driven by your personal interests and self-management. Doing that means communicating, organizing, thinking critically/creatively, researching, demonstrating media/literacy skills, reflecting, etc. Doing all of that means you’re going to learn and grow as a student and person.

So why track these skills? Tracking these skills is what helps you appreciate your growth. The growth tied to these skills help you become an expert learner. Life requires learning--both personally and professionally. These skills go far beyond this project (as posed in the question tied to reflection about these skills: What’s the value of that skill beyond the project (in school or life)?). Not only will they help you in the second half of high school, but they’ll also help you in whatever comes after that--whether that’s work, military, college of any kind, family (or any combination of these things). You may learn a lot as you work towards your goal and create your product. What’s even more awesome is that what you learn as a result of that work is something that you will carry with you for a long time.

Please also remember that you’ve been developing these skills through your MYP classes. You’ve got this!

What you will likely find is that you naturally have evidence emerge in each stage of the project that fits these categories. You may have charts, planners, pictures, notes (the types of things listed in the process journal).

There are a lot of ways you can reflect on your approaches to learning. The IB provides this document: ATLs in Action. It provides concrete templates tied to various stages of the project that may help you see how you’re applying skills.

If you want to step through it in a different way you can use the detailed questions/characteristics listed as a part of each category and cluster of Approaches to Learning. Do not let this list overwhelm you. You may find that you are applying skills from some categories/clusters and none from another. That’s ok! It really depends on what your learning goal/product is and how you work to achieve it!

Do what works best for you! If you see another way to do this, do it. As always, this is just a starting point!