1 Launching project work
Getting off to a good start with a project is important. This section has two activities that will enable you to do this. The first involves organising an event to stimulate interest and the second involves organising your class to discuss possible questions that they could investigate.
Organising a launch event
Very often, the beginning of a project is just like a normal lesson: the teacher hands some papers or books out and tells the students that they are going to do a project. There are much more interesting and exciting ways to start a project with your students. An entry event for a project is a good idea, because it engages your students’ interest and starts them thinking in a critical and creative way.
Starting a project doesn’t have to be very complicated or involve lots of planning. It can be as simple as holding a lively class discussion, or giving your students a thought-provoking picture to look at. It could be asking them to listen to a radio programme or an audio file that you have downloaded. (You could use your mobile phone here if it can be connected to the internet.)
Entry events that would need more planning could include:
- a field trip to a local factory, building, college, habitat, etc.
- a guest speaker from the local community
- a video clip from YouTube or similar.
These type of entry events require more planning and preparation time, but they can have a much greater impact on the students. This leads to better project experiences for all concerned and more learning.
Activity 1: Plan a launch event for a ‘sources of energy’ project
This activity will help you to prepare and carry out a project launch event with your class.
Decide which of the suggested project entry events appeals to you, or think of an alternative entry event that would be equally effective. Plan how to use the entry event with your class to begin a project on sources of energy in an unusual and exciting way.
Whatever launch event you choose, remember that you are looking for something that is not what you would normally do with your class. It needs to be unusual and memorable for the students. Remember, at the end of the launch event you want your students to be full of enthusiasm for their projects.
 Pause for thought
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Deciding on a question for the project
Projects that are framed around questions will stimulate your students’ curiosity. A good question sums up the project in one clear, concise and compelling statement. It should be linked to your planned learning outcomes. Some example questions are:
- ‘Is it safe to drink river water?’
- ‘How can we reduce the pollution in the schoolyard pond?’
- ‘Why do you need tread on your shoes?’
- ‘Why do we need vaccinations?’
Or it can be about an abstract concept:
- ‘How can we better feed our growing population?’
- ‘Which is better: science or superstition?’
Activity 2 will help you develop a question for a project with your class. You could do this activity in order to start the project, or you could do it after a launch event.
Activity 2: Brainstorming a good question with your class for sources of energy
This activity is for you do to with your class. If you have not used brainstorming before with your class, you will find it helpful to look at the unit on brainstorming.
- Tell your class that they are going to begin a project related to the textbook chapter on sources of energy.
- Give your students 15 minutes to read the chapter carefully. Tell them that they must do this on their own.
- Arrange your students into groups of ten with mixed gender and ability. Prepare these groups in advance. Read out the student names for each group and allocate a place in the classroom for each group to sit. Allow the students moving time to get into their groups.
- Give each group a large piece of blank paper. Ask the group to nominate one scribe.
- Tell the scribe to write ‘Sources of energy’ in large writing in the middle of the paper.
- Tell the groups that they have ten minutes to brainstorm all the questions they can think of about sources of energy. They can use the textbook and what they already know about the topic.
- After ten minutes, ask each group to read through their questions. Ask each group to choose the two most real-life, interesting and challenging questions from their brainstorm that could form the basis of a project.
- Write the questions from each group on the blackboard.
Once you have a set of questions, what you do next will depend on whether you want your students to do the project in groups or on their own. They could be given the chance to select a question to investigate or think of another one, or you could ask them to vote for a question that they investigate.
Why this approach is important