As the new school year approaches, I’m re-editing, once again, my PBL text that has been a “work in progress” for about seven years now. Every year my colleagues and I at my old school would take the input from our department and the students in the course and improve upon the work. This is what the teachers at Phillips Exeter do every year to their original materials as well. I think the idea of the problem sets being organic and dynamic is really the only way to think about problem-based learning – to believe that you can learn as much from the students and how they view the problem as they can learn from the problems themselves. In fact, while cleaning out some old folders this summer I ran across this quote, which I believe, is from Freire:

“The problem-posing method does not dichotomize the activity of the teacher-student: she is not ‘cognitive’ at one point and ‘narrative’ at another. She is always ‘cognitive,’ whether preparing a project or engaging in dialogue with the students. He does not regard cognizable objects as his private property, but as the object of reflection by himself and the students. The students – no longer docile listeners – are now critical co-investigators in dialogue with the teacher. The teacher presents the material to the students for their consideration, and re-considers his earlier considerations as the students express their own. “

Pretty amazing the way he’s got it right there, I think. That once you put that problem out there, it is no longer yours, but everyone’s to work with and the students need to be part of the responsibility for the learning. It is presented to them “for their consideration” you must reconsider your earlier consideration once they express theirs. That’s the deal you make when you use PBL – that you will do those reconsiderations. It’s part of the pact.

However, the kids need to be part of the pact too. Wait, let me back up. So, I’m sitting at my computer typing and my son, who is going into ninth grade geometry this fall, asks me what I’m doing. I tell him and editing my geometry textbook for my class for the fall. He asks me if he’ll be using a book like that – that’s not a “normal” textbook. I tell him, I don’t think so – I think his school uses a traditional geometry textbook that pretty much will give him direct instruction in the classroom much to my dismay. And he says to me with a sigh of relief, “Phew…well, that’s just fine with me.”

Of course, I’m thinking…whoa, hold the phone. Have I failed as a parent? Have I not instilled any intellectual curiosity in my son at all that he wouldn’t want to have some type of investigation going on in his mathematics classroom? I also had a very interesting experience starting at a new school this past year that traditionally had mathematics classrooms that were taught with direct instruction. It definitely took some time for students to get used to the idea of a teacher that did things a little differently. Student expectations for being “given” knowledge were extremely high and my expectations for them to construct knowledge were extremely high. It was an interesting situation.

Anderson (2005) found that many teachers who taught with PBL-type pedagogies found reluctance and resistance in students for lots of reasons. Even though they enjoyed the classroom more and even learned better in the long run, there a few downsides. Because of the habits of mind that students have formed in traditional classrooms they do not feel they are being “successful” unless the known authority figure (a.k.a. the teacher) is telling them they are right or wrong. The typical “received knower” that many students are in American classrooms today have “grown accustomed to learning in a classroom that required little from [them] in terms of engagement with mathematics” and they find it difficult for themselves to take responsibility and control for their learning in the way PBL asks them to. What can even happen sometimes is that these kids who are resistant can glom onto a student that seems to take on the attributes of the teacher or authority figure (in their perception) and a small group can become a microcosm of the traditional classroom if a teacher is not careful.

However, from working with teachers for many years and my own personal experience, students are actually very adaptable. Spending time in the classroom with this type of learning, students learn to adjust their own expectations and realize how much of a give and take there is – how much support to expect and learn that they are pleasantly surprised by what they can accomplish on their own.

I’d like to think that even my own son would be proud of himself if give the opportunity and I might give him some problems outside of class this year just to see what he does with them. However, it is just that pact that I was referring to before that the students have to buy into. If they don’t do their share and express their considerations on the problems, there is no dialogue to reflect on, there is no sharing that has gone on. And there enlies the rub – you are back to square one with direct instruction. So I’ve told myself that at the beginning of the year this year, I’m making that part perfectly clear that they have just as much say in the dialogue about what we’re learning and I hope they get the point – at least faster than they did last year!