MIDDLE YEARS PROGRAMME

A POWERFUL SELF-DIRECTED LEARNING JOURNEY

BY GABE KEMP, MYP COORDINATOR AND TINA KENNEDY, PERSONAL PROJECT COORDINATOR

One of the greatest joys as a teacher is to see students learn with passion. Each year since 2014, our Middle Years Programme (MYP) IB students have embarked on a journey to complete a culminating Personal Project in Grade 10. Each independently explores an area they are passionate about over a 10-month period, to demonstrate skills they’ve learned during the MYP – research, thinking, communication, and self-management skills.

Students are paired with a faculty supervisor to help guide them through the process. They align their learning in one of the MYP Global Contexts, to answer the question ‘why is this important’. They develop a personally challenging goal and design a product or outcome to meet their goal. Research might include online resources, surveys, and interviews. Students plan how they can complete their project successfully and record their progress in individual ways. One of the key elements of the project is the development of success criteria – to articulate how they will know if their project meets their goal.

At the end, students evaluate their product or outcome using their own success criteria. They reflect on how their learning progressed and provide evidence to demonstrate their research, thinking, communication and selfmanagement during the project. A few examples are shown here:

Throughout the Personal Project, students engage in a topic that is meaningful to them, using skills they’ve learned in all of their courses, pursuing a goal they are excited about. It is amazing to see what students can do when they are given the space to navigate their own learning. We see them become independent and self-regulated learners, and this is a key attribute in becoming a life-long learner. It is our pleasure to be part of this journey with them and see them develop into inquiring, knowledgeable, and caring young people. ANDREW BEINGESSNER ’22: CREATING A NEW POLITICAL PARTY (GLOBAL CONTEXT: GLOBALIZATION AND SUSTAINABILITY)

“I couldn’t settle on one problem to solve so I decided to tackle them all by creating a mock political party. Before this project, I did not have as strong of an understanding of the connections between seemingly unrelated issues like climate change and Canada’s arctic sovereignty, or the opioid crisis and Canada’s justice system. Analyzing the connections between seemingly unrelated policy areas helped me gain an understanding of the interconnectivity

of everything in the world.”

ALIA NANJI ’22: WRITING A CHILDREN’S BOOK (GLOBAL CONTEXT: IDENTITIES AND RELATIONSHIPS)

STRESS COMPARTMENT

anxiety, reducing coffee intake, counsellor information, wrapping yourself with a warm blanket, breathing exercises, mindfulness and more “I interviewed Grade 1 students after they read my book, and they explained where their families were originally from. They said they loved the book because they could make the connection between their life and the life of Asha. I believe being able to connect to a story is what causes it to be so intriguing. The problems my family faced while immigrating were not uncommon; by spreading awareness about my family's difficulties, others’ difficulties were shared as well. That is important because I believe that everyone deserves to

Green Tea Stress Ball 13 Coping Cards: Lavender scent reduces have their stories heard!” KESSIA VARKEY ’22: STUDENT MENTAL HEALTH SUPPORT KIT (GLOBAL CONTEXT: IDENTITIES AND RELATIONSHIPS)

“I chose mental health as my topic because I believe I can make a positive impact amongst the rising number of mental health illnesses in student populations. I challenged myself to have a real-life impact on my target demographic, the students of STS. There are lots of resources inside and outside of our school to support students so I wanted to design a way to bring them together in one accessible location.”