IB MYP Community Project

What is the MYP Community Project?

Inquiry in the MYP Community Project

The MYP community project is a culminating example of inquiry because it reflects students' abilities to initiate, manage and direct their own inquiries.

The inquiry process in MYP projects involves students in a wide range of activities to extend their knowledge and understanding and to develop their skills and attitudes. These student-planned learning activities include:

• deciding what they want to learn about, identifying what they already know, and discovering what they will need to know to complete the project

• creating proposals or criteria for their project

• making decisions, developing understandings and solving problems, communicating with their supervisor and others, and creating a product or developing an outcome

• evaluating the product or outcome and reflecting on their project and their learning

The aims of the MYP Community Project are to:

• participate in a sustained, self-directed inquiry within a global context

• to generate creative new insights and develop deeper understanding through in-depth investigation

• to demonstrate the skills, attitudes and knowledge required to complete a project over an extended period of time

• communicate effectively in a variety of situations

• demonstrate responsible action through, or as a result of, learning

• appreciate the process of learning and to take pride in accomplishments

MYP Community Project Objectives

There are four objectives that have to be met to ensure success in the community project:

1. Objective A: Investigating 

i. define a goal to address a need within a community, based on personal interests

ii. identify prior learning and subject specific knowledge relevant to the project

iii. demonstrate research skills

2. Objective B: Planning 

i. develop a proposal for action to serve the need in the community

ii. plan and record the development process of the project

iii. demonstrate self-management skills

3. Objective C: Taking action

i. demonstrate service as action as a result of the project

ii. demonstrate thinking skills

iii. demonstrate communication and social skills

4. Objective D: Reflecting

i. evaluate the quality of the service as action against the proposal

ii. reflect on how completing the project has extended your knowledge and understanding of service learning

iii. reflect on your development of ATL skills

Students will use the presentation of the community project as an opportunity to demonstrate how they have addressed each of the objectives. Students will be expected to communicate clearly, accurately and appropriately.

Defining a Goal

Students will need to have a clear idea of the goal they wish to achieve during their community project. Students should:

• Define a goal to address a need in the community, based on personal interests

• Identify the global context

• Develop a proposal for action

Some examples of goals are:

To raise awareness

To participate actively

To research

To inform others

To create or innovate

To change behaviours

To advocate

Service Learning in the MYP Community Project

In the MYP community project, action involves a participation in service learning, or service as action. As students evolves through the service learning process, they may engage in one or more types of action:

• Direct service: students have interaction that involves people, the environment or animals. An example could include one to one tutoring (perhaps as part of a reading strategy for the academy's literacy programme).

• Indirect service: Though students do not see the recipients during indirect service , they have verified that their actions will benefit the community or environment. An example could be to write an original picture book to teach a language (perhaps for EAL students at the academy)

• Advocacy: students speak on behalf of a cause or concern to promote action on an issue of public interest. An example of this could be to present an issue in academy assemblies to reach a wider audience

•  Research: students collect information through varied sources, analyse data and report on a topic of importance to influence policy of practice. An example of this could be to analyse the use of non-recyclable packaging in the academy and present an alternative for its use (perhaps through Student Voice)

Global contexts and MYP community projects

Global Contexts

Global contexts direct learning towards independent and shared inquiry into our common humanity and shared guardianship of the planet. Using the world as the broadest context for learning, MYP projects can develop meaningful explorations of:

• identities and relationships

• orientation in space and time

• personal and cultural expression

• scientific and technical innovation

• globalization and sustainability

• fairness and development.

Below are some examples of community projects linked to global issues:

The Process Journal

Documenting the process

The process journal is a generic term used to refer to the record of progress maintained by the student throughout the community project. However, the media for documenting the process can vary depending on student preferences. It can be written, visual, audio or a combination of these, and it may include both paper and electronic formats. In the use of electronic and digital media, students are strongly advised to make digital copies of their journals or to transmit copies of their journals to an online storage site.

Students will be familiar with the practice of documenting the development of their community project in the process journal and can draw on techniques used to document the arts process journal, the design folder or similar workbooks in other subject groups. Students may develop their own format and design, although schools can provide templates or examples to support students’ work.

The process journal is personal to the student, in the sense that they are also exploring ways of recording their process. Students are not restricted to any single model of recording their process journals. However, the student is responsible, through their use of the process journal, for producing evidence of addressing the four objectives A to D to demonstrate achievement at the highest levels of the criteria.

Students show their supervisors evidence of their process documented in their journals at meetings or by providing access digitally. Although legibility is important, the recording of critical and creative thinking and reflection is more important than neatness and presentation.

Selecting process journal extracts

For the MYP community project, students should carefully select evidence from their process journals to demonstrate development in all criteria. These extracts are submitted as appendices of the presentation at the conclusion of the community project. The student should take responsibility for making the appropriate extracts available to the supervisor.

Students working individually should select a maximum of 10 individual extracts to represent the key developments of the community project. Students choosing to work in groups will submit a maximum of 15 process journal extracts.

The student should select extracts that demonstrate how they have addressed each of the objectives or annotate extracts to highlight this information.

An extract may include:

• visual thinking diagrams

• bulleted lists

• charts

• short paragraphs

• notes

• timelines, action plans

• annotated illustrations

• annotated research

• artifacts from inspirational visits to museums, performances, galleries

• pictures, photographs, sketches

• up to 30 seconds of visual or audio material

• screenshots of a blog or website

• self- and peer-assessment feedback.

Materials directly relevant to the achievement of the project should also be included in the extracts, as appropriate. For example, if the student has produced a questionnaire or survey that has been described and analysed in the report, they could include a segment of that completed survey.

An individual extract may include any of the formats that the student used to document the process. Extracts should simply be supporting evidence of the process and will not be individually assessed.

Successfully Completing the Community Project

To complete the community project, all four criterion must be completed and will be assessed against the  standards, which can be found here:

Further Information