PBL: Discussion & Group Work 

My target group is students with scores 3 or lower from MP1. I decided to target the group because I wanted to see if my strategy will help increase their engagement in class and bring them to higher scores for MP2. 

Resources

• Understanding the Gold Standard for PBL

• PBL: Public Products

Baseline data

At the start of MP2, I gathered names of students who had less than 4 from MP1, and noted their areas for improvement. Most of the feedback was distraction in the classroom, which resulted in less than satisfactory delivery of performance tasks. For example, out of 10 vocabulary words, they could only say 5 or 6. Out of 5 phrases, they could say 1-2.

Measuring success

I measured success through formative assessment during class and the final score of their performance task. Because the project is something they all invested a lot of time and energy in, they feel strongly about learning the related vocabulary and phrases. Except for a few who have attendance issues, most students did much better in MP2.

Choosing the right topic will set the students on the right path. It was so rewarding to see them engaged in lively discussions and put their ingenuity to work at their creation. 

Future adjustment is needed for the vocabulary I supply for them to form meaningful phrases related to the project. I tend to get overly ambitious, but I soon realize that I need to adjust the level to what they can handle.

From now on, I’m going to use PBL throughout, to fire up the students’ enthusiasm in learning Mandarin Chinese.