How to run projects in English lessons (PBL - Projects Based Learning)
I feel both humble and proud from all the requests to go further in details about projects 👍
It’s truly a great way to engage students into meaningful language skills development as students get to see first hand how the language skills learnt apply to real life
In this video, I address 3 important questions about projects in English lessons
1️⃣ How to pick a project
2️⃣ How to run a project
3️⃣ How to teach English language skills while running projects
1️⃣ How to pick a project
Always start by thinking of the final product, what students are going to produce
If there’s no end result, then it’s not a project
I like telling my students I want them to have something they made or did in English that makes them proud
Examples of projects are designing a theme park 🎡 redesigning the layout of the city 🌆 setting up a startup 📈 starting a blog 🎥 and so on
2️⃣ How to run a project
A project needs phases of development, just like in real life
Take my startup projects for instance
Students go from phase to phase of coming up with the idea and validating their idea, to analyzing the market and competitors, to selling their project to investors or potential customers
All this over a number of sessions ranging from 5 to 10 depending on the complexity
3️⃣ How to teach English within a project
There’s a bit of planning what language skills might come in handy and adapting to what comes up
In my startup project for instance, I knew describing in a concise and compelling way would be essential to the last phase so I planned that but of language development
But I also adapted and added be/get used to practice because the need came up in the sessions
The students wanted to describe changes of habits that their product would generate and what habits current users had
All good 👍
It went really smoothly and my students absolutely love these projects
The language truly comes alive in projects as the students are engaged and see first hand how the language skills they learn come in useful in real life 👩🏻‍🎓