Complete Lesson Plan 2: Creating and Refining the Driving Question or Design Goal:

Now that your students have done some background research into the topic, it is time for them to choose the specific driving question or design goal for their project.

The overarching driving question or design goal will be chosen by you(the teacher).

This will make the project manageable, by limiting the set of skills or content knowledge that needs to be learned and/or materials to be used.

The Driving Question or Design Challenge must engage the student and excite them- what is the real-life( or literature-based) goal we are trying to solve?

A good Driving Question is an open question, meaning that it has multiple valid answers( vs a closed question, which has a single right answer)- giving students Voice and Choice- but constrained enough to manageable.

Examples of overall driving questions:

• Design a food truck, its menu, its advertising and business plan.

• What types of erosion affect the landscape? How does this affect human life?

• Create a musical instrument

• How can the 3 little pigs build a sturdy house using different types of materials?

• How can we make water safe to drink?

• How can we keep things cold?

• What are different landforms? How do they affect human life? What are some man-made landforms?

• Design a game in Scratch with sound effects, score keeping, and 3 levels of difficulty

in this lesson you need to describe:

• Your overarching driving question or design goal

• Give an example of a final driving question or design goal, such as:

  • 1. Build a soda-bottle set of pipes that play a scale from C3 to G3

    2. What landforms determine the location of cities?

    3. Build a water filter to remove mud from water

• How will you have your students, working in small groups, brainstorm and narrow the driving question or design goal?

• You may want to create a driving question worksheet, with the overarching question, the team members, 3 brainstorming ideas, and final design goal that clearly defines who is the client and the project requirements.

 In order to efficiently use time in problem solving, the most important step is clearly defining what problem you trying to solve.

Interviews in User-centered Design:

In solving a real-life problem using the Design Thinking methodology, the first step is empathy- that of understanding the client's needs, generally through interviewing them.

Video: Interview Process & Principles in Design Thinking

https://youtu.be/wm0owkDg5fw (1:26)

https://youtu.be/cJQh9dTp1OE

From Stanford D-School:

How to Interview        https://vimeo.com/28128029

How Not to Interview https://vimeo.com/28127980

Submit the completed lesson plan on Blackboard

Write a student-facing assignment in your Google Classroom

Video: Selecting a Topic and Writing a Driving Question

https://youtu.be/OJJsZgoYnys

Lesson Plan #2-Driving Question_Self-directed learning (1).docx

Part 1: Frame the Driving Question(Science) or Design Challenge(Engineering) must engage the student and excite them- what is the real-life( or literature-based) goal we are trying to solve?

A good Driving Question is an open question, meaning that it has multiple valid answers( vs a closed question, which has a single right answer)

The overarching question or topic will be chosen by you(the teacher).

This will make the project manageable, by requiring only one general set of skills be be learned.

          Example 1: 3D Animation project

https://youtu.be/AL3R94km_mE?si=8P3QcSbrWNrQ9V4p

However, a basic tenet of project-based learning is that of voice and choice. To be meaningful, the specifics of the project need to be chosen by the student or student team.

Frame the general topic or driving question- such as "What is renewable energy? Design a system that uses renewable energy in order to reduce the use of fossil fuels".or  "What are different types of cells found in plant structures?" 

See  PBLworks-Essential-Project-Design-Elements.pdf  

PBLworks-Essential-Project-Design-Elements.pdf - Alternative Formats

Give examples of  3 possible specific driving questions, such as:

• What are tornadoes? What kind of damage do they cause?

• How do animals keep warm in the winter?

• How can we design and build a solar hot water heater?

How could you help students frame their own driving questions?

Part 2: Preliminary content Review: Provide a limited set of grade-appropriate content materials, such as videos, web links, or readings, on multiple aspects of the general topic, and on which students take notes or answer review questions.

In addition to paid subscription resources, such as Mystery Science or Generation Genius, there are also many free resources such as PBS Learning Media, Education Galaxy, SciShow Kids, and Crash Course Kids.

If these are provided as part of a curriculum program, such as Mystery Science or CS for all, describe them or attach samples.

This can often be done using observation stations, in which students rotate through a number of stations, each teaching a different concept or technique.

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Using AI to get ideas:- from https://www.aiforeducation.io/prompt-library-lesson-planning

Lesson Plan Idea Prompt

Acting as a Grade 3 teacher, write 10 possible driving questions for a 3 week Project-based Learning unit on climate change for Grade 3 students.

How to Write Effective Driving Questions   https://www.edutopia.org/blog/pbl-how-to-write-driving-questions-andrew-miller

The Driving Question or Design Challenge  must engage the student and excite them- what is the real-life goal we are trying to solve?

Examples:

• Product-Oriented: How do we create ______ to ______? This is a great type of driving question to use if you have a specific student product in mind. Notice that it isn't just about the product, but the purpose as well

• How do we create a podcast to debunk myths and stereotypes of world religions?

• How do I create an epic poem about an important episode in my daily life?

Introductions to PBL    https://pbltoolkit.weebly.com/introductions.html

Write a student-facing assignment in your Google Classroom

Video: Selecting a Topic and Writing a Driving Question

https://youtu.be/OJJsZgoYnys