DESIGNING REAL TIME PROJECTS FOR CLASSROOMS

Our surroundings to work

Skills and projects are connected


The top 10 skills required to thrive in the fourth industrial revolution as given by World economic forum are Creative, critical thinking, complex problem solving, people management, emotional intelligence, negotiation and decision making, adaptability and agility. 

Skill set for the future jobs

Developing these skills have taken top priority in almost all educational systems.  However, it has now become utmost important to consider two sides of a coin – i.e., expecting skill development along sustainable education.  To promote such versatile thought process among youngsters they are to be provided with a first-hand experience of what happens in their surroundings.  Projects manifest certain reality in the work done.  Projects selections are not that which are designed by education boards but those which are engaging and experienced in the world around them.  Real time projects are the one which is to be sought after.  Real time projects cannot be fixed by mentors or boards who situate themselves at remote locations.  They have to be locality based or even their existing community based.  After all it is these communities that lead towards nation building. 

Developing projects for classrooms is a systematic process.

Project process flow

Step 1: Identify the problem: Problem statement

The locality of a region is covered with many issues starting from removal of wastes to labelling of plants to traffic congestion.  The selection of issues is to be individual based.  These issues will be brought to the classroom and students allowed to substantiate and debate the reason for their selection of the problem statement. This allows the ‘Guide’ to group the ‘like thought’ students.

Skills targeted:  Critical thinking, creativity and Negotiation

Step 2: Developing a hypothesis

Students within their groups are allowed to brainstorm and bring out ‘what they feel’ are most suitable reasons for the problem at hand or simply the problem statement.  The thought process of various reasons for the above said problem is then finalised to statements which requires further inquiry.

Skills targeted: Critical thinking, Negotiation, People management, Emotional intelligence

Step 3: Design methodology for collection of data

Based on the hypothesis concluded students are allowed to research and work for their sample data collection. The collection can be questionnaire, experiment or research based on the directions of the thought process in the hypothesis.  The collected data is then to be analysed for cumulative meaning for the hypothesis set.  In case, the data does not match any of the hypothetical statement then students are provided scope for rework on the hypothesis based on the sample data and then proceed with Step 3.

Skills targeted: People management, Self-awareness, Coordinating with others, Stress management, Mistakes management

Step 4: Analyse and Decide

The final data collected from various sources are analysed on the finalized hypothesis. The validity of the data is decided based on various indices as indicated during discussions from the hypothesis.   The represented data provides scope for prediction of the past, present and future of the problem statement under consideration.  The entire process is now documented for the final action plan.

Skills targeted: Complex problem solving, Risk taking, Judgement and decision making, Documentation.

Step 5: Action plan

The predictability of the data provides students to devise an action plan which will further help them monitor and regulate the crisis that has arisen from the problem statement after data analysis.  This stage also allows students to search for global alternatives for the selected problem. 

Skills targeted: Cognitive flexibility, Critical and creative thinking, Complex problem solving.

The entire process of the projects will allow students to

Classroom process flow

Some typical topics for classroom projects

Type	Social	Political	Environmental	Economical
Topics	1.       Community Health 2.       Services 3.       Population statistics 4.       Culture & Tradition 5.       Festivals & Celebrations 6.       Poverty and hunger 7.       Gender biases 8.       Equality and Equity	1.       Elections 2.       Constitution 3.       Governance 4.       E-Governance 5.       Town/Village/City administration 6.       Judicial institutions and functioning 7.       Corruption and its causes	1.       Water management 2.       Waste management 3.       Pollution watch 4.       Greenery cover 5.       Eco friendly processes 6.       Climate 7.       Well being	1.       Responsible consumption 2.       Sales and Marketing 3.       Banking 4.       Profit and loss 5.       Occupation and growth 6.       Sustainable growth 7.       Trade and Sensex

The topics given are in a broader perspective.  Selection of one instance of the topics allows the students to ponder in the right direction.  Bringing up a global citizen is merely not about ‘successful people’ but more about ‘responsible and self-aware individuals’.  Education equation today brings in more technology which provides scope for versatile knowledge and indicative awareness about various topics. 

It becomes more of a teacher to ‘guide’ their students towards the right line of work.  I would say that 21^st century education is more about ‘searching, coordinating and streamlining’ rather than about ‘providing knowledge’.  ‘Right’ and the ‘Wrong’ are individual responsibilities and choices, hence education should show both sides for the student to judge and decide their stand.  Real time projects provide such scope to a large extent.    

DATA ANALYSIS FOR DEVELOPING COMPETENCIES

‘Data is the core towards tomorrow’s global revolution’.

‘DATA’ is generated in every process.  The multitudes of data generated are accumulating and companies are racing towards ‘data science’ with technology as a medium to analyse and predict future directions.  Education is not an exception in this scenario.  Assessments conducted in the year and throughout the formal education span of an individual accumulates data on his/her learning.  The correct analysis and feedback on such data has become mandatory in this learning process to measure progress.  The complete meaning of such data analysis gives the process and the individual a definition and a goal. 

When and how to analyse?

Analysis of data happens only when assessments are set with proper blue print.  For example,let us consider the CBSE blue print for Science as given. (Source: www.cbse.nic.in) 

The ‘typology of questions’ indicates the types of question designed for the exam, specifically ‘Knowledge based’ indicates the remembering capacity of the individual students.  ‘Understanding’ recognises the individual’s ability to rewrite in their own words or simply ability to comprehend while ‘Application’ takes a step further the understanding to apply the learnt to new scenarios or recognise the happenings and relate to learned.  ‘HOTS’ category allows students to compare, reorganise their understanding and correlate different pieces of information.  Judging or justify the outcome is rather a unique problem solving ability which helps build critical thinking among the learner in the last part ‘Inferential or Evaluative’. 

How can such paper be analysed?

The question setter sets according to the blue print and needs to allocate the questions based on the category to which they belong.  Core competencies already described in the blue print can be associated to questions relevant to the categories specified and the scored marks can be analysed based on these competencies category wise through the many software’s that are available in the market.  Today the options of LMS provides the scope for analysing such multitudes of competencies.

What benefits does this bring?

In the education world where competencies like ‘knowledge’, ‘skills’, ‘attitudes’ and ‘values’ hold importance, the above segregation of performance can provide ‘right feedback’ which allows not only the learner but also the instructor to focus on ‘the real areas of development’.  It is important to set the assessment framework to achieve the larger goal in a step wise process.  The process applicable for the classroom per year can be designed as given below.

Every period evaluation need not focus on all core competencies.  The focus on developing knowledge and understanding needs to be the goal initially which should be evaluated and developed during formative assessments.  The analysis and synthesis focus need to be developed during the ‘Unit tests’ conducted during the middle of the term. Data analysis and feedback on competencies from unit tests provide a pattern of learning behaviour of the individual.  The term end data analysis should focus on analysis and reinforcement of all the four (Knowledge, Skills, Attitudes and Values) core areas of individual development.  Since, ‘Developing habits are matter of practice with regular reinforcement’.

The performance analysis based on individual score cards allows the instructor and the learner to understand the ‘deficiency gaps’.  The gap does not build in a day, the space begins to set from the period where the ‘base knowledge’ was targeted.  To understand and help, teachers need technology support which saves time for developing a better monitoring system.

Sorting, Reading and Identifying misfit data is rapidly developing as a new ‘career zone’.  Teachers have been doing this to help students build a better future for years.  Equipping them with a better technical knowledge to make their work easier will allow them to spend more time on developing a better learner because….

‘The best teachers are those who show you where to look but don’t tell you what to see.’ – Alexandra. K. Trenfor.