Changes

I started a new PBL activity with my 3rd grade group yesterday. Students were made network executives in charge of creating a new game show to help students with meanings of words, punctuation, parts of speech, and literary devices. I found myself trying to lead too much. I needed to step back and be a facilitator. I realized this when students were having trouble and suggesting other ways to accomplish the task. I guess that problem statement could be a bit task-oriented. After I tried unsucessfully to organize them into groups to work on various parts, I gave them the job of organizing the groups they felt they needed. Since some of the categories were a bit overwhelming yesterday, I made a chart listing 5 or 6 things under each category for students to focus on. I also included continuing working on this project in my lesson plans for next week. I will let students decide if we (a small group anyway) work on each category together over a period of time or if they want to divide into smaller groups to handle each category and then be responsible for teaching the rest of the group about their topic. I know how I would do it if I were TEACHING (maybe) but since I am FACILITATING, I will present the options and let them decide . . . and they may come up with some other options. The control-oriented teacher side of me is having some difficulty but I am working on it.