Introduction
In March 2005 High Tech High received a $250,000 grant from the California Department of Education to disseminate project-based learning methods to teachers in non-charter public schools. As part of the project, High Tech High teachers have documented successful projects to share with collaborating teachers from local districts and across the HTH network. The current volume presents the fruits of these labors. The aim is simple: to offer practitioners useful, easily adaptable models of real projects.
The projects described herein range across the high school grades and academic disciplines. Yet they share certain characteristics. Most important, they are all teacher-designed. The designs tend to be simple and elegant, indicating a clear direction but offering many pathways to a solution. They address essential questions that are relevant not only in the academic arena, but also in the world beyond school and in students' lives. The projects all culminate in a product or performance, with intermediate products or "checkpoints" along the way. And finally, they all involve a significant amount of reflection on the part of both teachers and students.
We emphasize projects at High Tech High because we believe they represent an effective pedagogy, offering multiple entry points for students with varying learning styles and academic experience. They foster the development of important college and workplace skills, including time and resource management. They allow a holistic way to meet state standards while integrating the curriculum, so that students may see their work as focused, not situated in separate silos across the hours of the day. All of our students, including low achievers, demonstrate their learning publicly through presentations and portfolios, introducing an element of authentic accountability for quality work.
Cross-Walking Projects to Standards
At High Tech High our goal is to let projects drive the curriculum, rather than the reverse. Nevertheless, as High Tech High teachers develop projects that engage student interests, they are mindful of California State Content Standards for grades 9-12. In one of the projects described herein, for example, each student chooses a particular drug and creates a documentary about its effects on the human body. The unit addresses many state standards in chemistry, such as functional groups, bonding, the periodic table, and molecular structures. At the same time, the project integrates well with math and humanities and achieves real-world relevance as students use technology to create educational videos that can be shared with other schools as part of a broader drug and alcohol abuse prevention initiative.
We have structured the project descriptions to address the key questions that our partners have been asking about project design and management, curriculum integration, real world connections, meeting state curriculum standards, meeting the needs of diverse learners, and project assessment. In addition, we have included separate sections on assessment and on reading and writing in project-based learning.
Each project description begins with an "At a Glance" overview, followed by a brief author biography. Then comes the Project Overview, including products, essential questions, topics addressed, standards addressed, adaptations for diverse learners, and assessments. The next section is more narrative in nature, beginning with a project timeline, followed by a description of activities, assessments, and adaptations for diverse learners. The final section includes reflections by the teacher author(s), in the understanding that projects are fluid, never static, and that each project in the end raises questions about how it might be designed more effectively the next time around.
All of these project descriptions, and many more at all grade levels and across the disciplines, are available at http://projects.hightechhigh.org/. Additional projects may be found on the High Tech High website at www.hightechhigh.org. In particular, the visitor should go to the resource center at the home page, as well as staff portfolios contained at each individual school's web site.
We are grateful to the HTH teachers who have shared their work so generously throughout this dissemination project, and to the visiting colleagues who have acted as a sounding board and provided valuable input of their own. In the end, we hope that both new and experienced practitioners, at High Tech High and elsewhere, will find useful ideas in this volume: projects to adapt immediately, or ideas to apply to favorite projects.