Three Teachers Talk

Here is the Prezi – The Paint Job
See – “The Chop Shop” Handouts for the handouts to this presentation.

Sometimes the only thing needed to brighten up a room is a new coat of paint.  Have you ever found yourself saying, “They just don’t get it” or “I just can’t teach this another year?” Project-based learning has been around for a century but often is overlooked or forgotten in the classroom.  Making a real-life application and utilizing a driving question to “drive” the outcomes in your class projects, combined with the development of 21st-century skills along the way, may be just what your teaching needs.  Students (and teachers) will fall in love with learning again.  Project-based learning is the new “DIY” of teaching, and once you’ve tried it, you will never go back to the same old paint job again.

Chopshop Handouts

Presenting this session at TCTELA in Galveston, TX today:

While it may look like an old hunk of rusty metal to some, with a little elbow grease, you can bring that beauty back to life. Our vintage literature is like a classic car that needs some remodeling and restoration in order to make it revenant and interesting for our students, and sometimes even for ourselves! So pull on your jumpsuit, smear a little grease in your joints, and come into our chop shop! Through deconstruction (adapting/altering real-world texts), renovation (technology integration), and reconstitution (project-based learning) of our curriculum and our teaching methods, those classics can come alive again and be restored to all their glory.