Including other disciplines in a shared project is a great way to create authenticity and meaning for learners. Not only will it help students make transfers of learning. It will also open up the opportunity for deeper engagement and higher order thinking about project-related content and issues.
However, the benefits of cross-disciplinary PBL projects is not felt by students alone, but instructional staff as well. By collaborating on PBL designs, colleagues gain a deeper understanding of their own content areas due to being required to teach others about the big ideas and connections to their subject matter. Similarly, they begin connecting the dots between their own expertise and the curricular content in the departments down the hall.
Naturally, there are challenges to creating such an all-encompassing support system. The first that comes to mind is time. How can teachers from different grade levels or departments carve out adequate time to meet and plan with one another. Likewise, how can they creatively make time to ensure that students are end-of-year assessment ready while still teaching in a PBL framework. Additionally, communicating during the PBL process, once the Entry Event has kicked off the learning experience, and finding time to make sense of formative assessment data and what that means for each discipline seems to present a logistical challenge as well.
Nevertheless, to overcome such challenges and make interdisciplinary PBL a reality in my school, time and energy need to be invested in created a shared vision for Professional Learning Communities where cross disciplinary and vertical alignment becomes second nature. While the subordinate tasks required to create this type of communication and planning network are vast, being serious about making collaboration a top priority in my school is as valuable as in-class instructional time, because teachers are learners too. Their learning and how it is supported simply enhances the learning of students as a result.
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