In a recent conversation about project-based learning, one strong belief that schools have for elementary children is they are too young to make choices. I don’t know where this understanding comes from, but I do know what I have seen in children is the opposite of it.
There are differences between children making random choices about projects out in the world versus choosing a project among all the qualified projects vetted by schools. So it’s less about the ability to choose but rather what schools believe and the amount of work it involves.
If you go on a field trip with a group of 3rd graders, you can tell that children are not afraid of making choices but that nobody cares enough to truly see them.
When adults still hang up on the outdated belief that children are not capable, we are not fooling anybody else but ourselves.
