Project-based learning takes many forms. Sometimes it has button eyes and lampstand feet, like Lampy, who looms above Covington Elementary School kindergartners.
The 20 girls and boys in Tara Hart’s class decided a few weeks ago that their garden needed a scarecrow.
They made Lampy with a little tall-person help, but they figured out how to do it all by themselves.
In making their garden guardian, the children planned their course of action and cooperated at every step. They did math – voting and counting the results – and science – testing the scarecrow’s filling for durability and water resistance.
The kindergartners also worked on reading readiness – there are a remarkable number of books about scarecrows for this age group.
“It’s important that children have real-world connections with what they’re learning,” Hart said. “We’ve been using project-based learning quite successfully for a number of years.”
