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Overcoming Common Project-Based Learning Challenges in (PBL) Implementation
Project-based learning (PBL) is an inquiry-based approach that immerses students in real-world application and provides them the opportunity to develop essential skills like critical thinking, communication, collaboration and agency.
While PBL transforms student learning, classroom implementation has its unique challenges: it requires teacher collaboration and planning time, classroom management, careful lesson design and more. Designing and launching the first project can feel exciting and overwhelming. With 20+ years of experience in supporting educators in PBL implementation in schools, New Tech Network addresses some of the most common PBL challenges and supports teachers in overcoming them.
Challenge #1: Finding Time for Comprehensive PBL Planning
Understanding the Planning Time Challenge
Challenge: From designing meaningful projects to aligning them with standards and assessments, teachers new to PBL often struggle to find collaborative time to plan and learn with colleagues to create quality projects.
Solution: Creating schedules that include time for collaborative adult learning and planning within the school day offers benefits for students and teachers alike.
Schools should build time for adult collaboration within the daily schedule, to allow teachers the opportunity for collaborative peer feedback on project ideas and design, and the space to share strategies and solutions to PBL challenges together.
Creative Solutions for Restructuring Your Schedule
Adjust School Day Start and End Times
Implementing early release or reorganizing the beginning or the end of day class periods can be one way to recreate time in the daily schedule for adult collaboration.
Maximize Existing PLC Time
Converting some staff meetings to professional learning cohorts working together, can build in the adult collaboration time needed to implement quality PBL across a school.
Create Extended Planning Blocks
- Create extended planning time by stacking recess and lunch, or building upon already existing planning time
- Bank, or float, planning time so that some days have longer planning periods and others have shorter ones
- Maximize use of an elective schedule to create longer planning blocks for some staff while students are in electives classes.
Get access to a list of creative scheduling solutions from schools in our network!
Challenge #2: Authentic Assessment in Project-Based Learning
Why Traditional Assessment Falls Short in PBL
Challenge: Traditional assessments don’t always tackle the complexity of student learning in PBL. Teachers may find it hard to track individual contributions in group work or to design rubrics that assess both skills and content knowledge developed through a project.
Solution: Teachers need better assessments that give them accurate information about student performance in these areas. PBL can provide context to shift the understanding of what assessment is and what it should do for teachers and learners.
In more traditional classes, the majority of feedback students receive comes in the form of grades and comments as summative feedback on assignments and tests. While this data gives students some information about their performance, it is limited in scope. Assessment with rubrics in a project-based learning environment, allows teachers to provide feedback and revision throughout the entire project. This requires a classroom culture shift away from management and compliance, to assessment for authentic learning and growth.
Assessment Strategies That Capture Real Learning
The goal for assessment in a project-based learning environment is for learners to apply knowledge and develop essential skills. Educators need assessments that give them accurate information about student performance in these areas. The NTN Learning Outcome Rubrics give students more than a score; they are tools for growth. They break down the key elements of each learning outcome and offer clear guidelines for what success and quality work looks like at each stage of development. This helps students become more self-aware and take ownership of their learning process.
Learn more about assessment in student-led project-based learning and download the NTN Learning Outcome Rubrics here: How to Use Assessments in Project-Based Learning.
Challenge #3: Classroom Management in PBL Environments
Redefining Accountability in Student-led Project-Based Learning
Challenge: Some students struggle to keep up with new content or skills within a project. PBL facilitators must adjust and monitor learning in real-time to ensure that every student gains the knowledge and skills necessary to successfully produce a final product.
Solution: Most often, the answer to this challenge is that students need more scaffolding. Scaffolding is an instructional support or set of processes that help learners gain knowledge and skills they have not yet acquired. It often involves a series of interconnected tasks, building upon one another, designed to support students in meeting proficiency in concepts, skills, or content.
Building Systems That Promote PBL Success
Scaffolding in a project-based learning experience temporarily supports students as they build the skills and knowledge needed to complete the project. Resources such as graphic organizers, sample outlines, and learner-centered practices can offer initial support as students learn a new concept or connect to students’ prior knowledge. Over time, teachers may gradually reduce these supports, encouraging students to take the lead. To learn more about scaffolding in PBL, read: Scaffolding in Teaching: Supporting Student Success Through Project-Based Learning.
Another common scaffold used to support students is time management strategies. The balance of both project and team management combined with learning academic content can be overwhelming. Breaking projects into distinct phases or benchmarks makes the project process less overwhelming, helps students track their progress, and supports them in acquiring project management skills. Here are some strategies for time and task management:
- Create and assign team roles to help support group work.
- Provide project work log templates and calendar templates to scaffold time management skills.
- Model or facilitate team meetings with project teams initially, so they learn how to communicate with each other.
- Create peer feedback and peer teaching opportunities for students to learn from one another.
Supporting Struggling Students in PBL Environments
As you begin designing your project and scaffolds, start with a list of necessary accommodations and modifications for your students. It is also helpful to have a particular student in mind as you think about the scaffolding necessary for the project. What would that student need to be successful at every stage?
A few specific ways to scaffold for diverse learners:
- Have students preview the entry event with the Special Education teacher so they can receive extra support with the reading and difficult vocabulary.
- Plan for extra workshops with particular students based on their needs throughout the project.
- Provide differentiated readings or materials for students, delivered individually via an online platform.
- Provide extra support for a student who needs to complete their part of project work or model and support group communication and project management skills.
All students must feel supported in the belief that their voice matters and they can contribute to the overall classroom community. This type of culture is foundational so that students can embrace collaboration, discourse, and the higher-order thinking that they are asked to do in a PBL environment.
Challenge #4: Designing Effective PBL Lesson Plans
The Complexity of PBL Design
Challenge: High-quality PBL requires significantly more upfront planning than traditional lessons. PBL planning asks teachers to anticipate what students know and what they “need-to-know”, which requires the thoughtful planning of supports, while preserving student voice and choice. In addition, balancing real-world relevance and inquiry with curriculum demands can be tricky.
Solution: An effective project-based learning lesson plan includes several essential elements and New Tech Network created the Project Design Checklist to highlight those elements:
Begin with the End in Mind
Determine high-impact standards and skills for the foundation of your project’s design.
Design the Project Scenario
- Design an authentic scenario that will require students to meet proficiency in the standards and skills you chose, keeping in mind relevance to students, the audience, and the impact the work will have. To learn more about authentic scenarios and project ideas, read: What is Authentic Project-Based Learning?
- Create a driving question/problem statement.
- Create an entry event that will introduce the project, generate student curiosity and interest, and elicit need-to-knows. Tip: Bringing in community experts on project themes can boost the authenticity of the entry event.
Create the Path
Determine benchmarks with scaffolding (workshops, graphic organizers, templates, investigations) that will support student mastery of standards and skills and lead to final products. Read: Scaffolding in Education to learn more about scaffolding and benchmarks in PBL.
Plan the Assessment
Create rubrics that allow you and your students to assess progress towards mastery of standards and outcomes.
To download a template for a project planning toolkit and learn more about PBL lesson planning, read the Guide to Project Planning Toolkit.
For NTN events that support PBL Design Professional Development visit our events page for upcoming events in your region.
Assessment Strategies That Capture Real Learning
The goal for assessment in a project-based learning environment is for learners to apply knowledge and develop essential skills. Educators need assessments that give them accurate information about student performance in these areas. The NTN Learning Outcome Rubrics give students more than a score; they are tools for growth. They break down the key elements of each learning outcome and offer clear guidelines for what success and quality work looks like at each stage of development. This helps students become more self-aware and take ownership of their learning process. Learn more about assessment in student-led project-based learning and download the NTN Learning Outcome Rubrics here: How to Use Assessments in Project-Based Learning.
Your Path Forward: Building PBL Confidence Through Practice
Quality PBL design and practice develops over time and requires refinement and learning that only comes from experience. Celebrate small wins and learn from challenges as you go. Focus on student skill acquisition, growth and engagement as primary success indicators. Collect feedback from students about their experience on a project from start to finish. Build in post-project reflection days for students to self-reflect and to provide feedback on the project as a whole for future revisions.
Success Story: New to Project-Based Learning
On your PBL journey, continue to gather helpful resources and learn from others about processes and tools that help develop quality projects. Visit NTN’s Insights and Resources page to learn more about PBL design, gather examples of quality project ideas and read about schools that are finding success in PBL.
In this inspiring episode of NTN Unpacked Podcast, NTN team members interview two pre-K teachers from Gale Pond Alamo Elementary School in Odessa, Texas, who boldly embraced project-based learning (PBL) for the first time. As the first educators in their district to implement PBL at the pre-K level, they share a candid and uplifting look into what it took to connect learning to real-world relevance with their youngest learners.
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