Dear Visitors,

Thank you for viewing our short video on Supporting Students’ Science Content Knowledge through Project-Based Inquiry (PBI) Global!

This video features the culminating showcase for 120 9th grade students from two Cooperative Innovative High Schools in North Carolina -- one rural and one urban -- who engaged in cross-school, collaborative inquiry on the issue of global water and sanitation challenges.

PBI Global is a five-phase inquiry process that engages students and educators in asking a Compelling Question; gathering and analyzing sources; creatively synthesizing claims and evidence; critically evaluating and revising; and sharing, publishing, and acting.

The students featured in this video worked in small groups, composed of members from each school, for four weeks in order to devise and respond to Compelling Questions that necessitated the creation of multimodal inquiry products and sustainable, replicable, and scalable water filters.

At the showcase, students shared their products with fellow classmates, parents, teachers, and community members, presenting their findings in a tradeshow and proposing a solution to a global water issue in an advocacy pitch. After the showcase, the students participated in a Walk for Water, where they walked two miles carrying two gallons of water to replicate what many of the 2.1 billion people who lack access to safe drinking water at home endure every day.

In the discussion for this video, we encourage you to share your thoughts on this project and ask any questions you may have! We’d especially enjoy to hear about your experiences supporting interdisciplinary STEM through inquiry, as well as “inquiry to action” project models.

Thanks for watching!

This is an awesome project and a great video. I love that the students engage in authentic problems and become invested in the science through a sense of social justice. You not only integrate collaboration, authentic inquiry, but also build student empathy for those who have less than they do. Two questions: How will you measure impact? And how will you adjust the showcase if you can't get the students together face-to-face due to Covid 19?

Great project, and interesting video! I'd be really interested to see how this has impacted students ideas about the importance and relevance of science and scientific inquiry. Do you have plans to follow up with these students at a later time? 

a really smart to have a project that combines a local issue and global issue.  I especially like how the project not only teaches science but also builds on empathy.

Do you have your lesson plans/activities posted anywhere or a way to share them with other faculty?

Hiller, this seems like a great project. I especially love how you are able to help students see the problem by having them carry 2 gallons of water over a long distance! I would love to know how this is changing students perceptions of what science/engineering is, what scientists/engineers do, and whether the see themselves as future scientists/engineers. Are you collecting any of these data? 

Hi PBI Global Team,

Amazing video and very interesting on unique real-world problem that is related to the students' lives. I am interested in learning what instruments you have used in measuring students' growth in 21st century skills. Have you created your own instrument or are you using one from previous research? Do you care to share, please?

Hi Nahid,

Thank you for your interest in our project! For this particular study, we are investigating (1) how PBI Global supports students' science content knowledge, motivation, and engagement and (2) how PBI Global professional development influences teachers' attitudes toward engaging in inquiry with their students. 

The instruments we're using to measure these items are (1) pre-, during, and post-focus groups with students and teachers; (2) pre- and post-science content assessments with students utilizing questions from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Question Tool and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) 2061 Science Assessment Item Bank; (3) pre- and post-MUSIC Inventory to examine motivation with students; (4) pre- and post-Inquiry: Science Teachers Survey with teachers; (5) and an assessment of students' multimodal products utilizing a PBI Global rubric. The researchers also conducted fidelity checks through classroom observations during PBI Global implementation.

We have not yet measured students' growth in 21st century skills as part of PBI Global, rather we've examined students' cosmopolitan literacies development throughout the PBI Global process. We would certainly be interested in examining this aspect of participation in PBI Global and would welcome any suggestions that you have for instruments!

What an interesting project!  As others have commented, tying the carrying water activity into the project really rounds out the experience.  Are all student groups asking different questions under a united theme?  How do they obtain materials to build their projects?

Hi Jill,

Yes, carrying the water proved to be an important part of the project by helping students acquire empathy. Student teams came up with different compelling questions from the theme of Global Water and Sanitation. Our NSF grant provided some funds for materials and schools provided the rest.

Inspiring and exciting project...you can see the interest and engagement on the faces of the students--congratulations!  I'm curious about the intention behind the cross-school collaboration and what part that played in student teams' final projects.   At what stage(s) in the project was this brought in?  How was it used to push students' thinking?

Thank you presenters and commenters are great dialogue. Please keep it going! I have a few questions. How many students are you working with and how do you create the cross-school teams? In terms of the school teachers, are they doing this work during school hours and if so, how are they carving the time for that?

Hi Preeti,

We had 120 students participate from two schools--a rural and urban school. The teachers from the two schools placed the students in groups with about 3 students from each school on one team. Yes, most of the project was conducted during school hours. It was challenging but since this was a whole 9th grade projects, the teachers created a schedule that combined synchronous and a-synchronous work sessions. The principals at both schools were supportive so the teachers had flexibility with scheduling.

This is a question for all of the commenters. Do you think a project like this could work in your own cities? What resources besides money would you need? What challenges might you face?

I really like the project and liked the video: compelling narrative, with great footage. This looks to me like a great example of adding authentic and creative learning experience around an STS problem. Let Troy Sadler know about it (he probably already does). What I find fascinating is the potential for this not being based on entirely self-selecting in: I was wondering (and you may have already discussed this above): assuming the kids who are in the science or STEM choir can't get much deeper into it, were you able to engage and excite kids who were skeptical or disinterested or scared of science to engage and change their minds?

Beyond innovative STEM-learning, this project gives insight into tackling thorny topics like climate change or conservation that are often strained along the urban/rural continuum.  Rather than being lectured or persuaded about it, students get to walk into these conversations and self-learning experiences on their own.  Brilliant!  You have much on your hands with this model already but I wonder if you’ll find differences in the many STEM-learning related measures that you already have in place between the participants from these two cohorts. 

And I wanted to call out the crafty use of the video medium in your presentation!  Well done!  Who filmed and produced the video with you?  Many project teams here are on the lookout for good examples and eager to improve their video-making and visual narrative skills.  These short notes about the work behind the scenes help the viewers and give much deserved credit to an important part of the project and its story. 

Hiller, I thought you would be interested in viewing the presentation:  The USF-Ghana Water and Sanitation Collaboration: as it touches on some related themes. So enjoyed your presentation. 

Yes, I saw it. It's fantastic!

What an interesting project! I like the fact that you made the students carry 2 Gal water and experience the walk for water. 

As this is very related to issues of water supply in developing countries, I as wondering if you had international collaborators.

Kebreab,

We did not have international partners with this particular PBI Global, but have partnered with educators in China in the past.

Wow! Very interesting project. Could we possibly implement this project in our summer camp or Saturday Academy? 

Such an inspiring project. It is great to feel the difficulties of the undeveloped regions with compassion. At the University of Arizona, we have a program called indige-FEWSS in which we try to address water and energy hardships in Navajo Nation. Please check out our video.

I love how you had the kids carry the water to gain empathy! 

Thanks Brett! It's been amazing to hear from the students how the Walk for Water reinforces and expands the understandings gained through their inquiry, particularly with regard to empathy-building.

Great video and project, Hiller and Erin! It's so interesting the ways environmental problems become such rich contexts for integrating the content areas, which we just do not see enough of, especially at the high school level. Further, issues that directly affect youth or that cultivate and leverage empathy, like access to clean water, are so engaging to youth. They really dig in when they're invested. The solar powered sand filtration system was a great example of this! (By the way, I'd love to see a template for how the youth created that model-- WOW!)

I assume that you all know about the wine to water folks in NC? They come to classrooms and introduce youth to the water filtration systems that they're using in parts of the world that have limited access to clean water. 

My favorite part of this video is how youth are positioned as epistemic agents-- as knowers, inventors, creators. This is what we want for education-- now, more than ever! 

Hi Heidi,

Thanks for checking out our video! I just checked out Wine to Water's website. Thank you so much for sharing this organization with us -- a great potential connection for future projects! I'd be happy to share the Person Early College engineering teacher's email with you if you'd like to reach out regarding the solar powered filtration system.

Great project and thanks for sharing! Impressive authentic collaborative engagements, and in particular I'm intrigued with the potential of the collaborations as a spark toward students' gathering and evaluating multiple peer perspectives and the value this brings to their thinking.

Hi Dave,

Absolutely! One of the components of the PBI Global process is "critically evaluate and revise." As part of this phase, students engage in peer feedback sessions. Additionally, when students collaborate across schools, the intra-team dynamics are such that learners are sharing and reflecting on multiple peer perspectives. The showcase also encourages students to view each other's projects and ask questions. In terms of value, we've observed that listening to and internalizing peer perspectives influences the focus of student teams' Compelling Questions; how they gather, analyze, and synthesize evidence; how their inquiry products are revised and improved; and from a logistical standpoint, how the project workload is shared. Additionally, this particular collaboration between one rural NC school and one urban school afforded students with the opportunity to compare rural and urban school environments as well as water and sanitation contexts. In addition to peer perspectives influencing the complexity and nuance of their content knowledge, many students mentioned during our focus groups how navigating this project's remote collaboration has necessitated the development of their 21st Century skills. 

A great project with so many valuable contextualized hands-on lessons in STEM and socio-emotional learning.  Looking forward to reading more about content learning, impacts on student perspectives, outlook, goals, motivation, engagement with the curriculum.  .  

This is awesome! I too loved the water carrying exercise. You mentioned in another video that you used the MUSIC inventory to assess motivation before and after. Have you analyzed that data yet? 

Very interesting video!  As many others have already said, having the students actually carry two gallons of water for two miles was a very powerful image.  It must really cement for the students how different their lives are compared to children in other countries.

For actually facilitating this four week project, how many support staff were there?  Or to put it another way, how many people worked with the teacher in each class to help manage student groups?  What do you think the optimal number/ratio is for a project like this?

Great PBL project that has local and global impacts!  I'm looking forward to seeing your completed curriculum resources.