Giving Compass' Take:

• Project-based learning for all-day kindergarten can improve student behavior and growth. Introducing the planning, implementing and concluding stages of projects helps to expand creative opportunities. 

• What are the challenges of executing a project-based learning curriculum for Kindergartens? 

• Read about how project-based learning connects the real world with profound impact. 

As a former kindergarten teacher at a Title I school, Katie Benson said a majority of her students came from high-poverty households. So, when snack time rolled around, most didn’t have healthy options – or know about them.

“The kids didn’t know what are healthy foods or where to get them,” Benson, who now works at Ball State University in its early childhood, youth and family studies department, told a room of attendees at the annual National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) conference in Washington, D.C. “They didn’t know what these foods were called.”

At the time, Benson’s elementary school in Columbus, Indiana, was starting to infuse more project-based learning (PBL) into the curriculum. And after discovering her students’ unfamiliarity with healthy food options, Benson knew she had her classroom’s next project.

First, Benson had to figure out where the class stood on healthy food options. Together, the group made an “I wonder” chart, asking questions like, “Do we want to eat vegetables? What foods are healthy? Where do we get them?”

Food experts, including a local grocery store manager and a nutritionist, also spoke to the class about healthy food options and how to make them. Benson’s example of PBL follows a three-phase structure – planning, implementing and concluding – proposed by Michael Haslip, an assistant professor of early-childhood education at Drexel University who co-led the NAEYC session, which focused on PBL in all-day kindergarten.

PBL can allow for creative opportunities for learning, but when it comes to making this happen for kindergarteners, teachers need to strike a balance that ensures students are grasping concepts, Haslip said – not just enjoying a fun activity as a break from math or reading.

Read the full article about project-based learning all-day kindergarten by Jessica Campisi at Education Dive