PBL, Part 2: Review of a Website

Dr. De Gallo at the University of California, Irvine explains the method of PBL teaching and learning in his web page entitled "What is Problem Based Learning?". PBL is student centered, meaning that the problem is in some way relevant to the student's life and that students have some input in designing the goals of the project. Relevant, student centered learning increases students' motivation to learn. Also, it is important to realize that students' prior knowledge will affect how they go about acquiring information and solving a problem in a PBL scenario. Teachers must try to understand their students prior knowledge and learning styles in order to provide the best guidance possible to their students. Also in an effort to coach their students, teachers ask questions of students that require them to reflect throughout the PBL process. A typical PBL problem is usually in the form of a specific "case" or real world scenario. PBL situations are very contextual and in order to reach a solution students must learn the content and apply it to the given situation.

This was a very informational web page that discussed many of the controversies involved with Problem Based Learning, such as the students' abilities and inabilities to identify what they need to learn. The article also discussed in detail the benefits of PBL, emphasizing students' increased motivation to learn. I appreciated the concise manner in which the material was presented. However, I thought that this article was lacking in that it did not outline any method of solving a PBL problem. It would have been beneficial for the readers if this had been included. Also, I felt that a brief example of a PBL scenario and students' solution would have helped readers contextualize the ideas presented. It seemed to me that pieces of this article were geared towards those with little to no knowledge of PBL, while other sections were geared for those who had some previous knowledge and were looking for a in depth analysis of PBL.

De Gallo & Grant, H. What is Problem Based Learning? Retrieved from http://www.pbl.uci.edu/whatispbl.html