Buck Institute for Education

Home » Research » Assessing the impact of online technologies on PBL use in US high schools

Assessing the impact of online technologies on PBL use in US high schools

Jason Ravitz & Julie Blazevski

This paper summarizes attempts to understand how PBL is being supported by online technologies.  Findings are based on BIE's National Survey of PBL and High School Reform.

Several versions of this paper have been presented, but this is the most recent.

The abstract is as follows:

This paper examines online technologies that can support project based learning (PBL) and how much use of these technologies relates to time spent on this approach to instruction, perceived preparedness and ability to overcome challenges. It examines the responses of 331 teachers, from intentionally varied types of high schools, who used PBL or similar practices to teach math, science, social studies or English.  Findings suggest that teachers report more use of PBL, fewer perceived challenges, and a greater sense of preparedness when they use online technologies to support their practice.  While use of technologies differs across school type and subjects, the relationship of their use to PBL use is surprisingly consistent.  Results help us understand the prevalence of technology uses for PBL and how these are related to PBL use and perceptions, with implications for how new technologies might help extend the reach of PBL-related instructional reforms to more schools.

Some of the key findings include:

• There is a greater amount of PBL use and teachers report fewer challenges and a greater sense of preparedness when they use more online technologies to support their practice. 
• Many teachers have browsed online libraries of projects and resources but fewer have used online features for planning and managing projects is rare.  

All significant differences in were in the expected direction with feature use relating to a higher percentage of teachers who felt “well prepared” and a lower percentage reporting major/moderate challenges 

e.g., across school type

• In larger, comprehensive schools, use of a feature “to get feedback from other teachers or adults” was related to five of the nine PBL preparedness tasks
• Use of tools created “to help you or your students design and manage projects online” was related to teachers’ sense of preparedness in unaffiliated small schools across all nine tasks.

e.g., across subjects taught

• Among science teachers we see online feature use is associated with more PBL use (r=.36), a decrease in challenges (r=-.34) and increase in preparedness (r=.51).  
• There was a strong relationship between PBL use and use of online technologies among social studies teachers (r=.57, p < .001)
• English teachers who used more online features felt better prepared for PBL use (r=.33, p < .01).
• Although math teachers reported the least PBL use (mean z score =-.35) and felt least prepared (z=-.31), there was a strong correlation between online feature use and PBL use (r=.60, p < .001).

The direction of causality that seems most important is how online technology use increases or improves PBL use.  However, there is almost certainly a mutually reinforcing relationship wherein technology helps teacher implement PBL, but PBL also helps teachers integrate technology by providing reasons for its use.

Suggested citation:  Ravitz, J. & Blazevski, J. (2010).  Assessing the impact of online technologies on PBL use in US high schools.  Paper presented at Annual Meetings of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology.  Anaheim, CA.  October 28, 2010.  (Download a PDF of the full paper, below.)