Creative Project Based Learning

The best learning experience I went through today was on creative project based learning. There were a couple things that struck me as awesome.

Three rules for creative project based learning

1. Create context.

2. Make it sticky.

3.  Make it fun.

First, you need to present the material in context of a situation,  kind of like the old Mission Impossible series where the opening segment always had Mr Phelps listening to the mission should he and his team decide to accept it. To me its a beginning scenario  but he called it the context.
The second was to let the students ask all the questions based on the information given.  The team in mission impossible would ask questions and plan everything. 
The third step is to research everything they need to know for the project. They are acquiring the background they need to actually carry out the mission
Once they understand what they are to do, they begin to do the planning for the project or mission and they put the project together.

Finally, they prepare a report on the project like a debriefing the mission impossible team did afterwards.

Yes as a teacher you have an idea of the standards the project meets,  you also know which topics the students are going to explore while they do the project but the idea is to have the students use all they've learned to create the final product. 

This is the first time that I've had someone who gave me exactly what I've needed to start doing at least one project based unit in my math classes.  He gave examples for Math, Science, English, Civics and Social Studies so everyone in the audience came away with something.