“Tell me and I’ll forget;
Show me and I may remember;
Involve me and I’ll understand.”
-- Chinese Proverb

Place-based learning (PBL) offers children an opportunity to experience the community around where they live and attend school, all while learning information they need to be successful in their educational goals.  Place-based learning is not a different teaching methodology.  It is simply incorporating a child’s immediate surroundings into various subjects and aspects of educational instruction.

While teacher’s might question, “How much more work will it take?” the answer might surprise you.  It doesn’t really have to take more work…but just a different way of looking at what your objectives and goals are…and how to achieve them. Better yet, perhaps a more suitable question needs to be asked, “What can my class learn from a place-based experience?”  The answer is, many, many things.

PBL is that which is ‘local’ and can cover the gamut of areas from environment to history to culture to art and more.  It can be as local as your school building/grounds, the area neighborhood, or a destination/resource located in the surrounding city and/or counties.  Place-based learning can happen ANY place – the grocery store, the bank, a small stream, a park.  The possibilities are endless…and so is the learning potential.  The greatest challenge might just be how to reign in all of your creative ideas!

Place-based is many things, but most importantly it is REAL WORLD learning and it gets students outside of the classroom where they are thinking and listening, and gets them involved by doing.  Some people call PBL ‘experiential’ learning or service learning.  Others say it is ‘outdoor’ or environmental education or community-based education. 

However one defines place-based learning, the end result is the same – students can relate their experiences to the world around them while building a sense of connection with their school and community.  Students help to formulate the questions and find the ways to answer them.  Many subjects can be covered by a place-based learning experience, all while still meeting state-mandated educational standards and expectations.

The Grand Valley State University’s College of Education and its Community Outreach Office are excited to provide information about Western Michigan resources that are available to educators and schools.  If you’re not located on Michigan’s ‘West Coast,’ don’t worry….chances are there are resources available to you in your local community.  They can vary from historic homes and nature centers to museums, parks, and even the local grocery store.

Take a look at some the sites we recommend and are partnering with to develop lesson plans and learning activities for students from K-12.  You can click on each picture or link to learn more about each site. 

You’ll soon be able to find lesson plans tied to on-site learning at a number of these venues.  Also, if you want to learn more about place-based learning, visit the “Just Outside Your Front Door” Blog written by Forrest Clift, the Assistant Director of the Community Outreach Office.

And if you think place-based learning is just a ‘phase’ or a new fad, think again.  All you have to do is take a moment and remember a field trip you went on as a kid….you might not remember a particular classmate or the name of that one book you read in the third grade, but chances are you still remember that trip to the zoo, or the museum, or the park, or the……….well, you get the picture.

Try place-based learning as part of your classroom instruction and then share the outcomes and the experiences with us.  And if you develop lesson-plans that you find to be effective and fun --- share them with us at the “Lesson-pedia” section of colleagusplus.com.