Today’s post wraps up a multipart series offering suggestions about how teachers can help students see that lessons are relevant to their lives outside of school.

Project-Based Learning

Janet B. Walton is Senior Research Scholar at North Carolina State University’s College of Education. She is a co-editor of the STEM Road Map curriculum series, a series of books that provides project-based curriculum for students in K-12:

Both educational research and teachers’ firsthand experiences tell us that students are more engaged in learning when they can draw connections between learning content and their own experiences. We also know that this engagement can lead to student learning that is deeper, more personally meaningful, and more effectively retained than learning that lacks such connections. These kinds of connections give students the sense that learning is relevant—or relatable and meaningful—to them.

Relevance in terms of lesson content and delivery can be thought about in a few different ways. Relevance can be personal, where academic content is related to students’ individual interests and backgrounds and to their educational and career aspirations.

Relevance can also be contextual, where learning is grounded in situations in students’ own communities or in current issues and events. A specific type of personal and contextual relevance is cultural relevance, meaning that students’ sociocultural and sociopolitical characteristics are reflected in learning activities. Regardless of how relevance is viewed, however, the aim of infusing relevance into learning activities is to engage students not just intellectually but also socially and emotionally.

One powerful way to infuse relevance into the classroom is to employ problem- or project-based learning (PBL) approaches. In these instructional approaches, students are presented with open-ended real-world problems or issues and asked to learn about the phenomena associated with the problems or issues. Ultimately, students are challenged to use their learning to create their own solutions to these real-world scenarios.

The real-world scenarios can be actual community or school problems that students work to solve, or they can be fictional scenarios based upon real-world issues or situations. In PBL, students typically work in teams to conduct research, plan, and test their solutions, which may take the form of a physical product, a model, a system, or a process.

PBL approaches have the added benefit of integrating content from more than one disciplinary area. For example, a PBL unit that challenges students to learn about and create a solution to a local environmental problem might require students to not only learn about and apply science concepts and skills but also to learn about local government structure, read and analyze grade-level appropriate background materials, make a budget and calculate expenses, and present their solutions using technology. There are many ways to use PBL in instruction across a variety of contexts, disciplines, and grade levels. One useful resource for PBL is the Buck Institute for Education’s PBLWorks webpage.

There are a number of other evidence-based strategies for infusing relevance into the curriculum that can be used within the PBL approach described above or with other curricular approaches that engage students in hands-on, active learning.

Grounding students’ learning within their local communities using firsthand local examples of phenomena, taking field trips, and undertaking projects linked to issues at the school or community level can provide relevance to students’ experiences within their local communities. Engaging classroom speakers and mentors to participate in content delivery and activities provides real-world community and career connections and can be particularly effective when visitors share personal accounts of their education and career paths and when they come from sociocultural backgrounds similar to students’.

Finally, providing choices for students that allow them to make connections to their own personal interests can make learning relevant for students. For example, providing students with choices of deliverables such as an interactive game, a piece of art, a creative story, or a podcast that demonstrates their learning allows students to connect their learning to their individual interests.

Making connections between academic content and students’ experiences, contexts, and backgrounds through PBL and other instructional strategies can bolster student learning and spark enthusiasm that can lead to students’ ownership of learning and continued interest in academic topics. It is important to remember that what is relevant to students in one setting may not be relatable to students in another setting. Because of this, teachers should look for ways to adapt curricular materials to their own contexts and for ways to individualize learning for their students.

‘Knowing Your Students’

Chandra Shaw has more than 24 years of experience in education, as a teacher, reading specialist, instructional coach, and now a literacy consultant at one of her state’s regional service centers. Chandra is a TEDx speaker and amateur YouTuber:

In order to make lessons more relevant for students, the first thing you must do is get to know your students and learn how to effectively connect what you’re teaching to their lives today. Once you know them, provide lots of opportunities for them to show what they have learned in various ways and to different audiences that matter to them.

“Get to know your students,” This may seem like a no-brainer, but I’m often surprised at the number of educators who don’t know how to answer these two simple questions, 1.) “Who are your students as little humans? and 2.) Who are they as learners?” Perhaps it’s those last two words of each question that throw some for a loop because most can readily spew off demographic and assessment statistics about their students, which sometimes unintentionally leads to alarming stereotypes about the students and communities they serve.

However, knowing your students goes beyond generalizations about their race, culture, Generation Z’s, Gen Alphas, or digital natives. It goes much deeper into what motivates and demotivates them. Who or what do they actually care about? What do they think about how others perceive them? Do they even care?

Once you know their motivators, you have to work at incorporating those things into what you teach. For those things that they don’t “like” but you feel are still vital to their education, it’s about making sure that you always present them with opportunities to discuss, understand, and dissect “the WHY?” behind what you’re asking them to do. This can easily be done, in many cases, by simply building or tapping into students’ background knowledge and showing them how what they are learning connects to their lives today. It can start with something as simple as a brief discussion or quick write and sharing session prior to the start of a lesson.

Providing opportunities for students to collaborate on projects that are then presented to an audience that matters to them is also an important way of making students’ learning more relevant. As an elementary school teacher, my students always seemed to work harder when what they were learning was going to be presented to their peers or their parents or guardians in some way.

For example, during a unit of study on poetry, students learned about the different types of poems and were asked to create a poetry book of 20 poems that would be included in their own personal Mother’s Day Poetry Books. Each student then selected a poem to read aloud to their moms at our Mother’s Day Reception, which we’d throw each year.

There wasn’t a dry eye in the classroom as students, one by one, stood and read their chosen poems to their mothers. I never had a student that didn’t complete their book, even though 20 poems from a 4th grader seems like quite a lot!

When students are asked to discuss and create work that is meaningful to them, there’s no greater motivation. When teachers take the time to get to know their students and the people and topics they genuinely value, relevant, intentional learning is the ultimate product.

‘Know Your Students’ Cultures’

Daman Harris is the manager of the Professional Development Schools program and higher education partnerships in the Anne Arundel County public schools in Maryland. He is also the co-director of the Building Our Network of Diversity (BOND) Project, a nonprofit organization dedicated to recruiting, retaining, developing, and empowering male educators of color. Harris’ book, The Antiracist School Leader: What to Know, Say, and Do, is now available:

All effective teachers work hard to provide rigorous and relevant instruction to their students. The most relevant instruction is facilitated by educators who are culturally responsive. In order to be a culturally responsive educator, you must know your students’ cultures. And to know your students’ cultures, you must spend time in their communities. There’s no way around it. Connecting to cultures means stretching beyond student-interest surveys and ad hoc classroom conversations. Surveys and quick conversations often scratch the surfaces of cultures by discussing favorite sports, fashion, music/literary genres, foods, and holidays.

It’s imperative to visit students’ homes and broader communities. Embed yourself in the local context. Don’t just drive through; get out and walk around. As Dominique Smith and his team explain, “The view from the sidewalk is much richer than the one we see through the windshield,” (Smith, et al., 2017, p.29). Spend time at events that elicit family pride or promote elements of the larger community culture. In addition to nationality-based parade activities, you can attend athletic competitions, religious ceremonies, parties, and political events. You could also simply visit places where people work, shop, and play.

Extended visits to the community provide opportunities to learn about deeper levels of culture, such as nonverbal communication (e.g., body language, eye contact, personal space, physical touching). You can learn, firsthand, the options for food, health care, employment, legal aid, education, and entertainment. You’ll also get a sense of intangible aspects of culture, like the balance between individual and communal priorities, expectations of gender/family roles, displays of platonic/romantic relationships, the definition of hard work, the importance of fair play/honor, and the characteristics of beauty. All these things, in addition to the culture of your classroom, comprise the soil in which your students grow. As you help your scholars balance the tension between outside-of-school and within-school contexts, you’ll equip them to thrive.

In order to get the most out your time in the community, it’s important to deliberately plan your trips. Here are some practices to consider before, during, and after your visit:

Before visiting the community:

• Tell your students and their families about your interest in visiting the community. They’ll probably have recommended dates, times, and locations that will yield good experiences for you.
• Share your plans with colleagues. Perhaps one or more of them will join you.
• Adopt a learner’s mindset. You are not going on safari. While you’re hoping to have a good time, this is primarily a learning experience.

During the community visit:

• Understand your role as a curious visitor. You are not the arbiter of right and wrong, the interrupter of the status quo, or the savior to a needy people.
• Be aware of how your body language, tone, and vocabulary indicate your level of comfort in—and acceptance of—your new surroundings.
• It’s OK to take written notes or record voice notes to help you process and/or remember your new learning. However, ask permission before photographing or recording anyone else.
• Resist the urge to post on social media. You’re not doing this to brag; you’re doing this to learn.

After the community visit:

• Set aside time to reflect on the various sights, sounds, smells, and emotions you experienced.
• Consider how your experience can help you to connect personally to your students.
• Debrief your experiences with colleagues with a focus on how the trips have affected the way you plan to teach and learn.
• Consider how you can use cultural elements to enhance your upcoming lessons.

What you see in the community might be outside your influence; but what you learn in the community can be used to influence the trajectories of your students’ lives. Strategic use of your cultural knowledge, blended with your pedagogical expertise and personal relationship-building skills, allows you to plan rigorous, engaging activities that are directly connected to your students’ lived experiences. That combination of characteristics typically leads to student success.

Thanks to Janet, Chandra, and Daman for contributing their thoughts!

Today’s guests answered this question:

What are ways to make lessons more relevant to students’ lives?

In Part One, Meagan W. Taylor, Tonia Gibson, and Alexis Wiggins shared their ideas.

In Part Two, Georgina Rivera, Kelly Gallagher, and Mike Kaechele answered the same question.

In Part Three, Whitney Emke, Valerie King, Samantha Holquist, and Tameka Porter discussed their recommendations.

In Part Four, Michael Hernandez, Xochitl Bentley, and Dennisha Murff contributed answers.

Consider contributing a question to be answered in a future post. You can send one to me at lferlazzo@epe.org. When you send it in, let me know if I can use your real name if it’s selected or if you’d prefer remaining anonymous and have a pseudonym in mind.

You can also contact me on X formerly known as Twitter at @Larryferlazzo.

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