Middle School Project Based Learning Showcase Demonstrates Gold Standard of Learning

On Tuesday, October 25, Middle School students culminated their first quarter - and made ICS history - by holding the first-ever Middle School Project Based Learning (PBL) Showcase. This showcase gave students the opportunity to share their work with their peers, teachers, and families in a wide variety of formats. 

Eighth grade English students produced professional-grade Anti-Bullying and Pro-Kindness podcasts filled with research, interviews, and self-reflection to models. Click here to listen to their work on Spotify. Click here to view a photo gallery of their project presentations.

Seventh grade students created cell models on 3D printers, coded cells from scratch, built cells virtually in Minecraft, crafted them from cardboard, linked them with Legos, captured them in song, baked them into a cake, and everything in between. The students’ great work on the cell project not only exhibited their understanding of the topic, but also locked that knowledge in their long term memories. Click here to view a gallery of Cell Project photos.

ICS sixth graders made some astounding interdisciplinary connections – studying Greek myths, using them as inspiration to write their own myths, then coding a video game from scratch to tell their stories. They also studied Greek Art and created murals tying everything together, and many groups designed, laser-cut, and wired their own video game controllers. Through this project, the students employed skills in creative writing and editing while following the rules for storytelling. They also develop and coded video games based on the story, engineered and built the technology needed to play, designed and created a wall-sized work of art, and all the while, practiced planning, delegating, and collaborating The Class of 2029 knocked it out of the park! Click here to view a photo gallery of their work.

After this successful first showcase, the Middle School PBL team continues to follow the “Gold Standard” process of creating strong driving questions to guide the next round of projects, which will be showcased in January. More valuable information about Project Based Learning can be found at:

• Why PBL? – PBL Works

• Why Is Project-Based Learning Important? The many merits of using project-based learning in the classroom - Edutopia