PBL Simplified with Ryan Steuer
Ryan Steuer
Ross Romano: [00:00:00] Welcome, everybody. You are listening to the Authority Podcast here on the Be Podcast Network. Thank you for being with us, as always. Pleased to bring you a conversation here that's going to really cover a whole lot about project based learning. It's a topic that, of course, comes up a lot in education, but there are Things that are good to know about it.
There's challenges. There's places where people are calling things PBL that isn't exactly PBL, right? So I think we're going to get into all of that and give you some ideas, some strategies, some things you might want to try to advance in your environment. So my guest today is Ryan Stoyer. Ryan is an author, podcaster, and thought leader who specializes in [00:01:00] PBL.
He's a curious visionary who is a former engineer at a Fortune 50 company and a former eighth grade English teacher who now leads Magnify Learning, which is a PBL professional development company, and they customize their trainings every time according to what I have here. Ryan is author of a book called PBL Simplified, Six Steps to Move Project Based Learning from Idea to Reality, and we're going to talk a little bit about that today.
Ryan, welcome to the show.
Ryan Steuer: Hey Ross. Thanks for having me. Excited to be here.
Ross Romano: And we'll start out with a big question, and I'm sure there's many parts to this, but you can distill it down to what you believe is most compelling to start us off here, which is what is the case for PBL? What's the evidence? What have you, what are you using as the determiner for why you determined that you wanted to commit to this and really advance this in schools?
Ryan Steuer: Sure. I think my why comes from my experience, I think is where that always starts from. And I was an [00:02:00] engineer. and enjoyed it, but it wasn't a passion of mine. Turned out my favorite two days actually were the two days that we were working with kids out of United Way. I was like, Oh, okay.
Maybe I want to do something else in my life. So jumped ship to eighth grade English and started teaching traditionally. Cause that's what I knew. I was a good student in high school. We got a 4. 2, three sport athlete. But it kind of in some ways failed at high school, right? Cause I got done. I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life, right?
I even chose wrong. So I wanted kids to experience that, but in a traditional classroom, I wasn't getting through, right? I was big on relationships. I was in an English classroom specifically so I could have kids write about their lives and we could get to know kids, but it wasn't moving the needle for them.
You know, I had a learner who got to high school and he flunked out of high school his first semester, actually, of his freshman year. It's like, I didn't even know that was legal. So that was kind of a wake up call. So then PBL came along and it's like, we were in a failing school. I said, we've got to try something different.
And in our first year, we had a school within a school at the middle school [00:03:00] environment, and in the first year we had 25 percent of the kids, but we only had 8 percent of the discipline. In an F school, we would have been a B, and attendance wise, we were a percent and a half higher than the rest of the school.
It was like kids were coming to school, generally doing what they're supposed to be doing, and they're performing better. And the first three PBL units we did, all of my kids turned in all of the things they were supposed to. It's like, what? Like, like that never happened, right? Like I, we were in a, we were in the Southwest side of Indianapolis at an urban school.
Like I had kids that would finish the year with a 20%, right? Typically. And so something changed with project based learning. So right there, it was like, this is why I left engineering. Cause I wanted to have an impact on kids and on people's lives and project based learning like boots on the ground. Like I saw that happen almost immediately.
So super exciting. So honestly, that's my why kind of right off the bat.
Ross Romano: Yeah, one of the things that I've been having a lot of conversations [00:04:00] about lately for a variety of podcasts and also conversations that are not recorded for the media it's all about career connected learning the the ways in which states and and private it. Companies and schools together are kind of working to redefine what opportunities are available there, to redefine what we mean by college and career readiness and career and technical education and all these things, right?
And how that helps to define what the goals of K 12 schools need to be and what does it mean to have a student who is ready to graduate and ready to move on to the next step. And certainly I think that's a relevant context for thinking about what PBL can do to support that. And it's timeliness and relevance to thinking about particularly with schools who know they're going through the process of [00:05:00] iterating and redefining what is our portrait of a graduate?
What are the future ready skills and competencies and what it means? And not only, okay, how do some different techniques help a student maybe have a higher level of proficiency in the core curriculum, which is important in its own right, but also how are they equipped? to take those skills forward and create whatever the next thing is.
And I'd love to just hear your thoughts on PBL's relevance to that piece and how it how it helps students to foster that variety of future ready skills that enable them to do any number of things they might want to do.
Ryan Steuer: Yeah I think that's a super nice tee up actually Ross of like, right. It's an extension of my why. Right. So even if you look at myself and my journey, again, I got a 4. 2. I did everything I was supposed to do in high school. My dad was first generation college student. So he didn't really know what to show me though, to go.
He just [00:06:00] knew the engineering would be a good path forward money wise. Right. And I didn't know any doctors. I didn't know nurses. I didn't. So even in my setup and I'm, I was pretty blessed. I was at a rural school and things were going well, right? And generally people would say I was winning, right?
The education. And I still ended up really in a place I didn't want to be. So you think about that for all of our learners in their top five connections. Do they have a lawyer, a doctor, a pharmacist, and an engineer? I don't care where you want to go, but do they have people that are in the positions that they would maybe want to have.
You know, there's some really good STEM research out there that just kind of showed that when our learners are even just exposed to meeting someone who's a chemist, they're much more likely to see that as a possible career. So I think PBL is that vehicle to bring in community partners. Because there's a language barrier between community partners and the school system, right?
Like, if I'm an engineer and I want to go help out, I can't just show up at the front desk and say, Hey, I'd like to help, [00:07:00] right? It's like, well, okay, neat. Like, wait over there in that chair and I'll see what I could do. And and then the engineer's making copies or something. But how do we really use people's expertise?
And I think. And project based learning is a couple of really easy ways, right? Like maybe in the entry event, when you first launch a PBL unit, you can bring in a community partner or as an outside expert to come in the middle, it's more of an advanced move, but at least at the end at a presentation or an expo, you can bring in all these real life community partners for our learners to see that they might not see on a regular basis.
And some of our learners do of course, but some of them don't. And then you find out. Oh, like Ryan's a banker and he actually went to the same school that I went to and he had a single mom and gosh, he's just like me. I could be a banker. And by the way, Ryan drives a BMW. You know, that's a real life example from one of our community partners.
You know, we used to bring him in and he was strategically places BMW right outside the classroom window so people could see it. And then he'd come in and say, Hey guys, I went to the same school. You know, I had to [00:08:00] apply to a bunch of scholarships in order to get to college, but I did it. And you can too.
And it's amazing with that, like, 30 minute talk can do, like, yep, the standards are super important, we recommend that you start with standards when you build your PBL units, but that one interaction, outside of career day, right, which is, again, can be a great event, but it's a little more canned, this is, like, super personal, and these kids could be like, oh, like, I can see that, like, you had the path, I can take that path.
It's a super important angle for PBL.
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You've stated a mission of having 51% of schools that are using PBL by the year 2051 which isn't as far away as , it seems. Right.
Ryan Steuer: Yeah.
Ross Romano: we still, I mean, there's a lot of time between now and then, and yet the years tick on, how did you identify that? What's the, I mean, what's the current estimate of how many schools are using PBL, using it correctly?
So that we can kind [00:09:00] of determine what that growth looks like and why that's the benchmark.
Ryan Steuer: That's a great question. So, the best estimate that I'd heard was 10 to 15 percent of schools using PBL. And even in that, it's probably a fuzzy number cause you're going to define, we would probably define authentic PBL and maybe projects. And we have some delineations we'd probably make for us 51 by 51 is kind of that visionary, passionate. for us to go chase. And cause it was like, well we're helping all the schools that we help across the country we do training, coaching and they're moving. Like, well, what's our marker to move forward? Like, what if we get five more schools, 10 more schools? Like, that's great. But what would it really look like if the world, what if the majority of our learners graduated from a PBL environment where they're now empowered, they've got communication skills, they've got problem solving skills, they've got agency, right?
They're going into a career and they know how to learn on their own. They're in a [00:10:00] career that if they like it, they'll explore it. They'll excel. And if they don't, they'll move on. They'll go to something different because they actually know what they want to do. And they've got the skills to do that.
And that's what gets us pumped up. So 51 by 51 you, we can, My team almost got hung up on kind of exactly where you went. Like, how do you measure that? I say, guys, I don't care right now. Right? Like we'll, we've got 37 years to figure it out. Right? So, but let's move in that direction with the passion of what would it look like if our world had 51 percent of our learners empowered, fired up with all the skills that industry partners want?
What would that look like for those learners and for our communities?
Ross Romano: And so let's get into a little bit of. So I when I read out the full title, there's six steps that are listed out and we can even, I think, simplify it a little bit for the purpose of this conversation that essentially they're covering problem, solution, evaluation, right? And [00:11:00] there's a a variety of steps as well.
Particularly in the solution phase of understanding the potential solutions, choosing the right one, implementing. But definitely want to start with that probably. I think choosing when to use PBL, how to use it, what what are we trying to address with this? Why are we determining that this is a place where we should change our processes?
Why do we think this is the right way to go about it? You know, and helping our listeners kind of start to understand that, right, versus just saying, okay, everybody should be doing it and it's just a blanket thing you know, if I'm sure if we're saying that you're doing something that is working perfectly and you're getting the outcomes you want Don't mess with that, but if there's another place where you're saying, okay we're not getting the results we want and we need to figure out a way to, to do it differently this might be a way, but yeah, how about that problem phase, that identification of those areas, what are some of the things you would [00:12:00] advise on identifying where the opportunities are to potentially fit in some new strategies here?
Ryan Steuer: Yeah, I think you hit on the idea. You know, the six steps is if you have seven steps, you could still be really successful, right? It's not, the six steps aren't magical. They're they hover around the scientific process that And I think some of the secret sauce is, like I said, in defining the problem, when you look at your standards, there are inherently problems in there, right?
There's a reason those standards are those standards. There's a reason the argument of writing is continually a standard, right? Because of the higher level thinking skills that need to happen, of the applicability that can be there. So what I think the secret sauce is that we try to help teachers find.
is that they're an expert in their content area. So how do we match their geekiness, if you will, of knowing their standards to the real world? And for a second, some teachers will have a little bit of trouble. So I don't really see how it applies because we've got slope intercept form. What do I do with [00:13:00] that?
But they're actually the best person to help us figure out how standards relate to the real world, because they're the go between, right? And not everybody understands that slope intercept form is important or that scientific method can be used almost everywhere. And it's really great for your everyday life, right?
But we've got science teachers that are pumped up about that. So how do we help our learners? Go from the real world that they see and that they live in, that's filled with problems. How do we use the content, the schooling that's a part of their every single day, to connect the two? And when we do that really well, now we have learners that see that their education applies to the real world, and the things that they're doing right now.
Like the sooner we can bring the why closer to them the better off. So that's, if you can really design a great problem and connect it to your standards, it's really the place where we can get learners to lean in a little closer, And that's what I think inquiry is really all about, right? It's not a fancy bell ringer.
Inquiry is when our learners lean in and say, yeah, I actually do want to know more about that. So I'll give you an example. If a [00:14:00] biology teacher has to teach the Punnett square, right? So you're going to be talking about genetics and again, not inherently exciting to the average person, right? But science teachers will get fired up, but not inherently exciting.
So what if you come to your eighth grade students and you say, well, I've got a doctor here and the doctor comes in, the doctor says every day parents find out that their kid has a genetic disease somewhere in the world. And those parents immediately want to know two things. They want to know, number one, is my child going to be okay?
Number two, they want to know everything there is to know about that genetic disease. Hey, eighth graders, will you help create pamphlets for my office? And heads go up, and eighth graders go, well, actually, yes, I do. I actually do want to help people do that, right? And then the science teacher comes back in and says, okay, well, you guys are fired up.
Let's do this. You're going to need to know about the Punnett Square. You need to know about genetics. Eighth grader raises their hand. What in the world is a Punnett Square? Oh, well, if you guys want to help this doctor, you're gonna have to learn that. Do you guys want me to teach you that? Well, [00:15:00] yeah, I guess.
I guess you should teach me that so that I can help. You'll solve this problem. And that's the dynamic switch that we really want in a PBL environment is that I'm now learning my content so that I can solve this real world problem. And that's my real engagement. It's not necessarily a grade. There's still grades, right?
But it's like the grade isn't my motivation. It's to solve this problem. So defining the problem becomes a really important aspect.
Ross Romano: Yeah, absolutely. And so then. Once that's well defined, and, let's say, Okay I think that PBL could be a good solution to this problem that we're having. Are there a variety of ways of going about that? Is there a, how does that look, I guess? Is that a matter of scale? Of saying Are we committing to a school wide thing versus just the classroom? Are we doing PBL that applies to a particular unit versus our daily practice? Or how, what are [00:16:00] the different ways that there might be, I guess, some variability in how how an educator or school might choose to implement PPL and determine how it fits into the problem that they've identified.
Ryan Steuer: sure. So yeah, at a systems level maybe you've identified a problem of. engagement levels. You want to raise engagement levels. And we had a group out in Maryland had the same thing. So we want to raise student engagement levels. So we're going to use project based learning to as one of our means to tackle this engagement issue.
And at this district level in Maryland, they used actually a content area. So the social studies department brought in project based learning and they created PBL units within You know, the social studies arena K 12, and that's how they started their implementation and it's grown from there to other subject areas.
But that's how they started. Some schools will say, yep. Like we're going all in and you know, they'll bring everybody in and do a full training with their school. [00:17:00] And obviously if you do that, everybody's going to implement it a little bit different level, right? Because teachers are at different skill levels or different experience levels.
And then you. You kind of coach within that, but we all have this North star that we're moving towards PBL environment. And some schools will, we'll do something a little bit different and they'll do something called learning teams. And this is actually one of our favorite implementation models is you get a group that says, we're going to go learn about PBL and see if it works at our school.
And I actually like learning teams better than saying a prototype or we're going to just try this. So. We're going to go find out if it works here. And you get a leadership team that said, we're going to be our learning team and they go get trained. And now those teachers, probably a coach and AP, they're going to bring PBL back to their areas of expertise, their classrooms, and they're going to implement.
And what we find happens is now you've got success stories from that local school, right? Everybody knows Victor in your school, right? And Victor, when he presented like, go watch him, like, How in the world did you get Victor to do [00:18:00] that? Right. And now, so now instead of, cause I can give you a bunch of PBL research, right?
Like, Flo Lucas Foundation just did a really great study back in 2021, right? Super strong research. But most of the time if I'm a teacher in the classroom, I want to know if it's just going to help my classroom, right? I don't, it's neat that it worked over there. I'm excited about that. I'm glad it's research based, but what about my classroom?
And in these learning teams, you're actually answering that question. You're saying, look what happened with our learners in our community. Watch how PBL is affecting their learning. And it becomes a really powerful model then. Because now you've got the other teachers that weren't involved in the learning team saying, Hey, Can I want to get trained.
Can I get in on this? This is, when do my learners get to interact with the community partners and be in the newspaper and those kinds of things, and it's a little bit more of a gradual implementation, if you will, instead of a top down mandate of we're all doing PBL and right. If you were doing something different, you're wrong.
And we've never taken that stance because we know that teachers are working really hard and it's a very personal profession. So the learning team seemed to be a [00:19:00] great way to get started.
Ross Romano: How much does terminology matter in the case of PPL? I mean, is it important for educators to be using particular terminology and kind of finding a common understanding around that. Anything for students, I'm curious about.
Ryan Steuer: Yeah, great question. There's some that I think tends to matter. Now, if you say driving question versus essential question I'm not sure that matters a whole lot. We do have some geeky vocabulary, right? Entry events and need to knows and end to products and those kind of things.
Sometimes it's helpful to bring it in to show that we're doing something different, right? There is a different process to this. And I mentioned that six steps doesn't really matter. But clarity does, right? So we are doing something different. Like most of us grew up in a very traditional environment where teacher told us what to learn.
We did that. We wrote it down. And in fact most of us as teachers were really good at that. So that's what we tend to do. So bringing in the new vocabulary can be helpful to [00:20:00] show that something's different, something different's happening here. One other tweak that I think is really important, and it's not like I have to, but it's an interesting idea when it comes about is I'll often use the term learner instead of student. Just to change the mindset of that learner, right? That's sitting in a seat. And even for the teachers, a lot of times they'll adopt the term facilitator. They're now facilitating learning and they're giving up some of that control to the learner. And as soon as I use that term of giving up control, I remove there's kind of shivers that go through some, you're not giving the keys to the kids.
Like you're still the educator. You're in charge of the classroom. You're empowering those learners. So, so sometimes the vocabulary can matter just because it changes mindsets.
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Ross Romano: so then as far as reflection, evaluation you know, are there parts of this that are the qualitative versus the quantitative and how does it differ? if it does, from any instructional practice and [00:21:00] outcomes and are there specific things when it comes to PBL that would be part of that?
Is it mostly just, how did our students learn? And then then we can tell if what we did worked and what does that process look
Ryan Steuer: Yeah, I think that if it does, like, if it does differ is a really important phrase. Cause I think there's a lot of things that don't change, right? You're still going to have summative assessments. You have formative assessments. You know, you still need to know if Susie knows complete sentence compound sentences and those kinds of things.
You still have to assess everyone's learning. Those things are still happening. You can still have that unit test at the end of the unit. You're still going to have five paragraph essays, right? Like all those things are still in there when you're assessing your student learning. We might add some things, like how do you start to assess student collaboration?
Right, like that's, there's some great tools out there, some great rubrics. But most of the time, the conversation is the most important thing, actually. Like, how are we going to assess student collaboration? Cause if you're not assessing it, you're probably [00:22:00] not really getting it, but you're not teaching it and bring it to a higher level.
So you start to ask, how do we assess presentation skills? And those are really fun conversations for educators to have. And you just get educators around the table and you can do most of it in one faculty meeting, right? You won't. You have a fully defined rubric, but you have all the ideas there, and somebody can put it all together, and it's a really neat idea, and now you can start bringing it out to your learners, and they can start to see, oh, I'm here, and I could be here in collaboration and working with others, right?
And those are really powerful skills. You know, we started with industry standard skills. Those are the ones that are going to really catapult our learners further in their college and career goals.
Ross Romano: like? What are some of the pitfalls with, commonly, with the PBL implementation?
Ryan Steuer: Yeah, sure. You know, you mentioned kind of defining PBL for us, that authenticity is a big part for us at Magnify Learning. And we don't, I mean, there might be a place for scenario projects, but a lot of times if we're pretending to be somebody out in the real world, then [00:23:00] kids aren't fully engaged, right?
They're not fully getting the experience of solving a real world problem, right? If your pamphlet goes into a doctor's office, or I'm going to grade it on a rubric, right? There's just two very different levels of engagement that happen there. So, But at the same time, we don't expect everybody to start with a PBL unit that a 10 year veteran would have, right?
So we all have to start somewhere. So we look at it as PBL versus a project. We've got a fancy graphic and all that good stuff. But there are some things that are in a project that might not be in a PBL unit, right? PBL unit typically is going to ramp that up with your community partner. Gosh, other pitfalls.
That's a good question. I think the top down mandate is a pitfall that happens sometimes you get a really excited leader. It says, wow, I went to a conference. I read Ryan's book and now we're all going to do this. And it's like, that's great. Like, that's a great vision. Like, first of all, figure out your vision, bring in a leadership team to see where their vision's at and cast that vision, but then invite people into the vision as opposed to just slamming it down, right?
It's [00:24:00] meet everybody where they're at. Because again, our educators, our teachers in the classroom, they're passionate. They're working hard. They're doing all that they can to serve our learners. Learn English for free www. engvid. com And I think PBL could be the twist that magnifies the work that they're doing. And they're probably doing some portion of that, right? They've got voice and choice in there somewhere. They've got a presentation that could be tweaked. So meeting people where they're at and really finding the bright spots has been a place that we've gone to, but we've seen the pitfall of maybe the top down mandate.
The last one I'll mention that's a passion project of mine is succession planning. You know, as you're talking to leaders on this podcast is you're doing really great work in a lot of different areas. How do you make sure that continues after you leave that position? Because a lot of our principals are going to move on after three to five years, which is totally fine.
I guess part of the process, but how do we get systems involved? And how are we bringing up the next person that's going to be in that seat? So that those things continue. Succession planning is a piece that I think we overlook in education that our friends [00:25:00] in business don't, right? Because they've got some other outside forces that force those things.
And sometimes we. I don't know that we give that enough care.
Ross Romano: Right, yeah, and then succession planning in schools can happen in a variety of different ways, right? Is there, it could be an assistant principal that gets a principal job in another school, and that was the person who really was more hands on with the instruction and it, so the principal didn't go anywhere and maybe the principal remains committed to using the practices, but isn't the expert in them.
And then there's a place of where do we get that guidance or support. And we didn't know this was going to happen. It happened kind of quickly. So, I'm sure having processes that are always in place, you're always prepared for that or succession at the classroom level. A teacher moved from the school or there's, This person changes to that role kind of thing and [00:26:00] all those micro successions that it doesn't exclusively mean that the leader changes and a new leader comes in and says, I don't like PBL or you haven't been doing PBL, we need to do it and et cetera.
So, that, that's a good point. And and also to your point of the. You know, the challenges with the top down mandates, certainly, I think that goes back to what are the outcomes that we're looking to achieve that we're not currently achieving and okay, and because we need to get there, we need to put strategies in place, but just saying, this is just the way I want everybody to do teaching without having a why and This teacher is saying, well, my students are thriving with the way we're doing it, so why would I change it?
And another one is saying, well, my students are struggling, so I'm open to trying something new, but it's not going to be successful unless [00:27:00] I kind of get what we're trying to accomplish there. And balancing that, I'm sure, with what the benefits could be of the collective efficacy around. You know, teachers all doing it and being able to learn from each other, but trying to determine the right way to get there, I guess, with letting it evolve in a way that is organic in a sense, and it builds, and okay, we have one success, and then we try to achieve a second one, and so on, and learn from one another that if it's just happening in small pockets that We might be missing out on making it even better, but if we're just making it a mandate, then that probably means that a lot of people are not going to fully invest in it either.
Ryan Steuer: Yeah, we think that you can build the grassroots movement on purpose, right? I don't think it has to be an accidental spark somewhere. [00:28:00] I contend that it is the leader's job to cast the vision, right? And they, now, it doesn't mean that they go up on the mountaintop away from everybody else and come back with this vision and say, go, but they do cast the vision and then they invite people into that vision.
So again, I like the leadership team idea. I think teams are really important. You know, invite your coaches, APs, lead teachers. Hey, this is the vision where I think we can go. And like you mentioned here's the vision. Here's where we're at. And here's the gap, right? And if you can get everybody involved in that process of identifying the gap, then we're all in on board.
And then it's the leader's job to say here's the steps that we're going to take to go after that gap. And here are the resources and the training that we're going to provide to help you. help us eliminate that gap. But you definitely want it to be an us and a we, right?
Not just a me.
Ross Romano: You know, so, as we, we talked about the terminology and one of the reasons that I think about it is one, sometimes, of course, when we are inside of something, we might be a [00:29:00] little too married to the jargon of it in a way that either forces people to try to understand certain terms that don't really necessarily make a difference to them, right?
But also, as practices are created, as they're implemented, as they become successful, then a lot of people then they start to lose their definition and people start to just call all kinds of things PBL or whatever the case may be, right? And so, relatedly I'm wondering from your experience, what are some of the things that happen in schools that people might call project based learning that are not actually authentic project based learning according to the way you would define and implement it?
Ryan Steuer: Yeah, sure. So if you go from my geeky side of things, right? And you know, I'm all in on PBL, right? Obviously at this point. So, here's [00:30:00] an ex, I'll just give a classroom example, right? And both of these are real life examples is some young learners get together and they're going to plan out these tiny houses for people that move into the community. I think that's awesome. So they bring in an architect, the architect talks to the class and then they build out, they, they plan out. These tiny houses and they're for specific people and their final project, they do an expo and they show kind of via diorama style, right? These cardboard cutouts that they have of the layouts of these tiny houses that they've created and they've collaborated.
They've done some they heard from a community partner. But the exact same unit was done in another school and they actually built the tiny house, right? They got together with a builder and the builder agreed to build these tiny houses for people in the community. I know one group that did it for people that were in a tough position, right?
They didn't have housing. Another one did it for military families that were moving in, right? But at the end of the day, those learners went, had the same community, had [00:31:00] similar community partners, and at the end of the day, they could point to, The work that was done from a third grade classroom because of third graders, these tiny houses exist, right?
Because they collaborated and there's a, there's almost like a visceral, like change there, right? Of like, I helped build these houses and I'm. 10, right? Or 10 or 11. And it's so empowering. And the same thing happens in you know, a third grade, different example, but they built the playground around their classroom or around their school.
Sorry. They already had money for it. Right. And they were going to just put one in and the teacher said, well, what if my kids planned it? And they planned it around all types of different learners that might be in their school or might not be, and the different disabilities they might have or different abilities they might have.
And so the kids learn empathy and all these people, but at the end of the day, there's this thing that was created, this problem that was truly solved because these learners were involved. And if they hadn't been, it wouldn't be the way it is. It wouldn't be as effective. [00:32:00] If adults put in a playground, they don't necessarily think about every learner the way that the learners do.
The learners actually went to playgrounds, other playgrounds, and took notes, right? So, For us, I think that's the biggest difference is when you bring in the authenticity of creating things, or maybe it's a passionate speech that you give at a school board meeting. It doesn't have to be a thing that you make, but learners are impacting the world around them right now.
And so moving the Y forward is kind of a phrase that we're starting to use more and more. is like, Hey, this is going to be really helpful for when you get to college. Ah, hold on a minute. Like I'm a ninth grader and I'm trying to get through the day, like that four years. I can't even see it. Right. Most adults can't see four years ahead, but when you are working on something that's going to be completed within your school year, within the next six weeks, you're I can see that why it's important to me.
I think it's a huge difference.
Ross Romano: Yeah, absolutely. So a lot of our listeners are in school leadership positions. So they might not be the ones doing this at the classroom level, but certainly have a [00:33:00] very important role to play as far as making decisions about the. The practices that they want to prioritize in their schools, ensuring that there's the right curriculum resource, professional learning, instructional leadership, et cetera to support teachers.
What are some of the important things specifically for a school leader to think about? When determining if, how, why, when, where this all fits into to what they wanna do in their school.
Ryan Steuer: Yeah. That there is a lot, especially if you're a school leader that hasn't done PBL in the classroom, right? You're like, am I qualified to do this? And of course you are, right? Cause it's going to be a part of your vision. There's just some education that you'll need. My first step, I think for everybody is to go to a school visit, go find a place where you've heard that there's good PBL going on.
And that's why we have model schools across the country that you can go see. And when you go to those school visits, my favorite thing to do is because like we do a panel with teachers, with the [00:34:00] administrator and with students, but then in the in between times, go talk to the learners and go see if they're really doing neat work, right?
Like, but if once you step in there and bring some of your teachers, bring community partners, if you can, parents, and go see if this is the type of school that you want to be. And I think that's the same for PBL or any initiative you're going to do, right? If you're going to go do. If you're implementing PLCs before you go do that, go to a school when they're doing their PLCs and you go step in on them and you get to feel just by being there, you get to feel if this is really something that you want, because it is a commitment, right?
If you're going to do like project based learning, if that's going to be your new instructional model, however you implement it we have a three year plan that we put schools through to where they have their own PBL certified facilitators. I mean, that's a big commitment that you're making to really changing instructional model because there's mindset, there's culture.
Now, obviously I think it's worth it, but as a school leader, you have to figure out is this the step that you want to take? I think a school visit is just undeniably the best first step.
Ross Romano: Totally. [00:35:00] So PBL simplified is the name of the book. And so there's a lot of strategies for simplification. What's the, I guess there's a fine line somewhere between simplification and oversimplification and ensuring that things are. Simple, doable, practical while still protecting the integrity of what authentic PBL is.
Where is that line? How do we find ourselves on the right side of it?
Ryan Steuer: That's a good question. So, yeah, so the title PBL simplified, the idea is that it's not PBL watered down, right? So it still has hard edges. It's still authentic, but we've also done a lot of work over the last 10 years, right? Where we know some things at work. We've got group contracts at work. We've got implementation process and actually with the audience being school leaders and PBL simplified, there's two chapters dedicated towards school principals, one on implementation and one on leadership.
And so for [00:36:00] me, the line again is the authenticity, but if you're getting PBL from teachers pay teachers, or it comes in a box, right? It's, I don't, it's probably not real PBL because in my mind, right? So you've oversimplified it at that point. In fact, organizationally, we've made, we've taken the stance that we don't have any we don't have a project library that's public.
We do actually for people that are in our community, but that's because we've been able to give them mindset work around it. If we just give you a PBL unit to go do you don't have the mindset yet. You know, you don't have I don't know how we could build in your local capacity for that, right?
Your local community partners. For instance, if one PBL unit is super successful because you've got a really great bank CEO that comes in and I give you that unit, but you don't have a really great bank CEO as one of your community partners. I don't know how that could be successful. So we don't do curriculum.
We are actually a skills building organization. So we're going to, we help teachers create their own curriculums. through [00:37:00] mindset and protocol. And for us that's probably the line. I've never actually been asked that question. That's the simplification line, right? Is because we want to, so we simplify the process and the structures from leadership and teachers but we can't give it to you.
We can't just give you a PBL unit to do for us. That's actually the line because then you haven't been involved in the making of that. So you don't really know the heart and the mindset of the work.
Ross Romano: yeah. Let's, as we're sort of putting a little bit of a bow on this if we can maybe illustrate a little bit of the change, like, and let's talk to the school leader again. Okay, I'm walking through the halls, I'm looking in classrooms, and I'm thinking about what I'm going to see if I have teachers who are really doing some effective PBL and how that contrasts with what I might be seeing now or or how it might contrast with.
PBL, that's not really PBL or not done correctly, right? What are some of the things that I'm [00:38:00] going to see happening in classrooms that are going to make me happy,
Ryan Steuer: Yeah. Great. So in the evaluation realm, right? There's always a piece of like, Learners are 75 percent engaged, right? 75 percent of my kids are engaged. It's like, the question is how do you gauge that? Does it mean that 75 percent of the kids are quiet and doing what they're supposed to be doing?
Cause that might just be compliance. Like that does not mean engagement, right? So we have to define engagement. correctly. Now, I also don't advocate that when you go to a classroom, it shouldn't be chaos, right? That you might see some collaboration. You might see kids moving around in stations. You might see some protocols being done.
I don't know, as a teacher, you can always, I think you could just tell, I think principals can too, the level of volume for collaboration versus level of volume for chaos, where it's like, there's a teacher, like a classroom management issue, right? And it should get to that classroom management issue.
It should be controlled. And I don't even call it controlled chaos, controlled collaboration. And the other piece that I think would be interesting for school leaders is you begin to see teachers [00:39:00] become more empowered and have more agency. We see again and again, when teachers bring in PBL and they're they become a facilitator, if you will, they kind of see a shift in their role.
Now they're saying, it depends on how you lead this, but they might say Hey boss, I'm bringing in a community partner on Friday. Would you want to come in and see? And they're not asking for permission necessarily, right? Because you've already given that to them. You say, Hey, go do this. It's good for kids.
And there's, you're starting to see that they're taking more agency. And they're bringing in different aspects that you've asked them to without you having to go in and like say, well, we're this month, we're focusing on formative assessment. So when I come in, I want to see it on the board, right?
They're doing those things because they know why they're doing it. and they know that it's empowering their learners in a different way. So when you go in to answer your question directly, when a principal goes into a PBL classroom, they should be able to go in and assuming you know the six steps, if you will, right?
You kind of know where [00:40:00] they're at in the PBL process, right? If there's a community partner up there talking up front, it might be an entry event. If it's a workshop, then you're going to see maybe a little, some direct instruction. And then you're going to see an activity. You might see a lab. All those things, all those best practices that happen in a classroom every day, they're still involved in PBL, they're wrapped up a little bit differently, and then you might see an expo, you're going to say, wow, our multipurpose room is getting used a lot more than it used to.
You know, we've got a lot more community partners checking in at the front desk, right? So I would think that those are some of the things that you're seeing. And what comes out of that, maybe one last thing, is that as community partners come into the building to see the amazing thing that your learners are doing, They're telling better stories when they go to Rotary Club, when they go to the Chamber, and when they're at the soccer game, right?
They're starting to tell the stories about your school that are making the newspaper and that are noteworthy. That's exciting.
Ross Romano: you know? Yeah. So Ryan, you also have a podcast called PBL simplified for some [00:41:00] of our listeners who have the wheels turning now, and they want to continue their journey to learn more about this. What kind of things would you be covering on the podcast?
Ryan Steuer: Sure. So, PBL Simplified Podcast, we've been going for five years now, so the 200th episode is coming up. We do showcases. So we actually just went through our model schools where we actually showcased different schools. So large district, small district, K 12 model, so that you could kind of hear about the different models from me.
And then the next week we actually interviewed one of the, what I call movement makers that are in the middle of the movement. So it might be a principal of that school. So you get to hear about the school and then you get to hear from someone in the school. It's really designed in a lot of ways for school leaders.
And then we also do a teacher showcases where we'll bring in a PBL teacher to talk about one of his or her PBL units, which is a great one to pass on to your teachers.
Ross Romano: Yeah, excellent. And so the book is called PBL Simplified. It's available from Amazon [00:42:00] or wherever you get your books. Listeners will, we'll link to that below so you can find it if you want to read more about it. PBL Simplified podcast, we'll give you a link for that. Ryan, what other resources would you like listeners to check out on your websites or?
wherever.
Ryan Steuer: Sure. We've got a, an online community that we've just started up. It's the, so it's the most active PBL online community. that I have found yet. So, we actually have moderators in there that are on staff to make sure that things are continually moving and there's continually new content. But probably the easiest way, actually, if you're if this piqued your interest, if you will, just go to whatispbl.
com. That's whatispbl. com. And we've got some free resources for you specifically for administrators. So you can pick teachers or administrators, and we just give you a set of resources to get you started.
Ross Romano: Excellent. Listeners, make sure to check all that out. We'll put the links below. We always make it easy for you. Everything's right there. So you can click through and find out join the community, learn about more resources, learn about [00:43:00] school level things that you might want to get support with whatever helps you.
It's all there for you. And please do subscribe to the authority if you have not already. We'll have more author interviews coming your way every week, covering all the topics that matter to education leaders, or you can head over to bpodcast. network to learn about all of our shows, find your next great listen find anything that really solves the challenges you're having or piques your interest there.
And Ryan, thanks so much for being here.
Ryan Steuer: Absolutely, Ross. Thank you for the opportunity and thank you for the podcast. You just have such a wide array of guests that you bring on. It's a great asset for our school leaders. Well, thank you.
Ross Romano: Thank you.
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