Reflection from the Problem Solving Approach

 The Task

Over the past two weeks, my peers and I have been preparing to deliver our "problem solving approaches" to our cohort in lab. The problem solving approach is a systematic way to approach real world problems that allows students to work to solve the problem. In 412, we learned 4 types of problem solving approaches, they are: the forked road problem, the possibilities factor problem, the solutions to be improved problem, and the effect-cause problem. 

For this lab, I decided to add the situations to be improved problem into my global agriculture unit. The title of my lesson was "How can we address the four pillars of food security?". During this lesson, I would introduce students to the four pillars of food security and then ask them to determine while pillar of food security is being affected in a given scenario. After students identified what pillar was being affected, I would then have them create a plan for how they could help alleviate the problems within the scenario. In other words: "here is a scenario, now, how could you improve it?".

Setting the Scene

After completing this lab, one thing I felt that I really struggled with was providing clarity as to why we are completing the assignment. A lot of my peers suggested ways that I can make this feel more "real" to students. Such as having them create almost a proposal to an organization or to a group that could complete this assignment. I think I could have done a better job of putting this into a better context to my students, especially when I am in front of a group of 9th graders instead of a group of my peers. 

Making it Matter

In my mind, I was already thinking about what students should know that has already been covered in this unit, however, my peers obviously do not know this information going into lab. In an ideal world, this lesson would really be pulling together the importance of food security and being a global citizen. This lesson would really being pulling together where we see all of the issues we have been discussing in the real world. After gathering feedback from my peers, I realized that this maybe wasn't as clear as I had anticipated and I should have provided myself with more directions on how I should have verbally introduced this concept to students. 

Overall, I really enjoyed being able to use the problem solving approach in my lesson. I think it provides a great way to check how well your students understand a topic and their ability to apply the knowledge that they are learning. As we move onto week 9 of the semester, I am excited to continue writing more unit and lesson plans and prepare for a week at the World Food Prize with the Global Orientation to Agriculture Learning (GOALs) program!