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100 Driving Questions and 25 Final Products Related to Covid-19 Pandemic

Disclaimer: This post assumes that you are already doing responsible online teaching: checking the social and emotional state of your students, giving meaningful feedback but NOT grading their work, and not overwhelming them with too much work.

What should PBL look like for crisis distance learning? It should include lots of student voice and choice exploring content through their passions. Without the pressure of standardized testing and curriculum requirements, now is the perfect time to try PBL with your students.

So where should you begin? I made a list of some Driving Questions that could launch student inquiry. I would not recommend giving students this entire list to overwhelm them, but perhaps a subset that are age appropriate. I considered organizing them by subject area, but most integrate multiple subjects so use this as an opportunity to break down those false silos that we call content. So without further ado, here are 100 Driving Questions (link to PDF) to spur your thinking:

Driving Questions:

  1. How do we balance individuals rights and social responsibility?
  2. What form of government is best situated to handle a pandemic?
  3. How has Federalism led to tension/problems between the federal and state governments?
  4. What should be the roles and responsibilities of each branch of government in an emergency situation?
  5. What are the roles and responsibilities of local government in an emergency situation?
  6. Who should make decisions about quarantines, closing schools and businesses?
  7. What should be the consequences, if any, for people and businesses who ignore quarantines orders?
  8. What is the role of police in emergency situations like coronavirus?
  9. Who should be responsible for an adequate stockpile of PPE for hospitals?
  10. What is the appropriate federal response to the economic ramifications of the pandemic?
  11. Who should receive bailout funds and how much? (Small businesses, large corporations, unemployed, etc.)
  12. What requirements should the government mandate for aid/bailouts?
  13. How does the government stimulus package compare to past government initiatives? (New Deal, Bailout of banks in 2008, etc.) 
  14. Should the government raise or lower taxes and for whom?
  15. Should the government pay for all healthcare during the pandemic as proposed by
    Biden?
  16. Since it is an election year, how has the pandemic become a political issue?
  17. Who should be held responsible for the spread of the pandemic? (WHO, China, US government, etc)
  18. Will the federal government expand its powers and budget after Covid-19 like it did during the New Deal and post-9/11? (new agencies, PPE requirements, social distancing laws)
  19. What is greater, the rights to person freedom or the safety of emergency workers? 
  20. What is the role of the media during a pandemic?
  21. How is quarantine different/similar to the domestic front during war? (Compare to WWI, WWII, and the Cold War)
  22. Why does the United States have such a high percentage of the Covid-19 cases compared to the rest of the world?
  23. How does the high percentage of African-American deaths due to Covid 19 reflect inequity?
  24. What is the purpose and role of the CDC and FDA in potential treatment and vaccine for Covid 19?
  25. What is your daily life like right now?
  26. How has your family’s life changed due to the coronavirus?
  27. Compare your daily life right now to _____________(letters or diaries of people in other important historical times such as the Great Depression or occupation during war).
  28. What should be the requirements before large events like concerts and sports return?
  29. Who should be prioritized to receive coronavirus testing?
  30. Who should be prioritized for access to ventilators?
  31. What is more important, public health and safety or economic growth?
  32. Are the shelter in place orders constitutional?
  33. What future laws/policies should be enacted to protect ourselves from a pandemic?
  34. Should doctors and nurses be able to refuse to work in hotspot areas if they are not provided adequate PPE?
  35. How does the coronavirus show class inequality?
  36. Will our economy rebound? How fast or slowly? What should the government do to help?
  37. Should people be allowed to go to church or other places of worship during a quarantine?
  38. How will coronavirus shift cultural norms? (handshaking, hugging, dancing, group socializing)
  39. Should people be allowed to protest and demonstrate during a quarantine order?
  40. Should the government be allowed to temporarily close businesses during a quarantine?
  41. If a vaccine is developed for Covid 19, should it be mandatory for everyone?
  42. Do you know someone who has died from Covid-19? If yes, how are you handling it?
  43. What is the psychological effect of quarantine?
  44. Describe how your family is growing closer or distancing during quarantine?
  45. What are the similarities and differences to other historical pandemics? (Black Plague, Smallpox to Native Americans, Spanish Flu)
  46. How should schools change in response to crisis distance learning?
  47. Should price gouging be legal in a capitalistic system?
  48. What are the limits of capitalism shown during coronavirus?
  49. Should the US enact tariffs against China due to coronavirus?
  50. What is the role and responsibility of the United States toward other nations during a pandemic?
  51. Should the federal government have the power to nationalize private businesses?
  52. Should the president have the power to declare a national quarantine?
  53. Should the U.S. restrict immigration during a pandemic?
  54. How should the U.S. respond diplomatically to China’s lack of full disclosure of the pandemic?
  55. How should the U.S. prepare for possible future pandemics? 
  56. What is the balance between individual freedoms and the public good?
  57. Should the government have the power to define “essential” businesses?
  58. How has quarantining affected the environment and climate change?
  59. What “new” quarantine habits should we continue after Covid-19?
  60. Why do most plagues originate from animals?
  61. How do viruses make us sick?
  62. How do vaccines work?
  63. How do viruses mutate?
  64. What should be the conditions before “reopening” society?
  65. What is more important: maximizing health or maximizing the economy?
  66. Are government bailouts effective?
  67. Should prisoners be temporarily released?
  68. Why has Covid-19 heavily impacted the Navajo community? 
  69. How does the philosophy of flattening the curve work?
  70. How is the spread of Covid-19 exponential?
  71. How does social distancing slow the spread of a virus? Bonus: entry event
  72. How does the body fight off viruses?
  73. What country has had the best response to Covid-19?
  74. What dystopian novel relates to this pandemic?
  75. Should the federal government “bailout” schools?
  76. How does housing density affect the probability of contracting the virus? 
  77. How does exposure time out of your house affect the probability of contracting the virus?
  78. What is the impact of living in the city vs. living in the country?
  79. What demographic features are most susceptible to Covid-19? (sex, race, age, social-economic status)
  80. What is the acceptable risk level to re-open society?
  81. How can we predict “hotspots” to prepare ahead of time?
  82. Why do people hoard?
  83. Why can’t stores keep toilet paper in stock?
  84. Should the government enact and enforce PPE laws?
  85. How should “essential” businesses be defined?
  86. How should people maintain their physical and mental health while social distancing?
  87. Should we move to mandatory absentee balloting?
  88. How does the pandemic affect global trade?
  89. Should home internet access be a right?
  90. How does the pandemic impact future job markets?
  91. Which companies benefit/suffer from the pandemic?
  92. What is the best response to mass unemployment?
  93. What should be in a pandemic survival kit?
  94. How long does coronavirus live on different surfaces?
  95. Should the federal government let states go bankrupt?
  96. How do we balance federal bailouts and the national debt?
  97. Should we loosen FDA requirements on experimental medicine?
  98. What is the impact of less driving on the environment and the economy?
  99. What will be the permanent economic effects of remote shopping?
  100. What should school look like for 2020-21?

Final Products:

What should students create or make as their final product? The possibilities are endless, but here are some ideas that mesh with the DQ’s above:

  1. Simulation where students are the government handling the pandemic
  2. Mathematical charts, graphs, statistics
  3. Diary of your quarantine experience
  4. Dystopian short story critiquing an aspect of the response to the pandemic
  5. Lab experiments to design tests
  6. Economic opinion podcasts
  7. Sketchnote video explaining different government roles
  8. Pros/Cons website
  9. Public Service Announcement targeting greatly affected groups
  10. Proposal for equitable law change
  11. Infographic advocating for behavior change related to physical, mental, or public health or the environment
  12. Quarantine garden or cookbook
  13. Art piece 
  14. Propaganda poster
  15. Digital scrapbook of Covid-19
  16. Poetry about quarantine or the psychological impact of the pandemic
  17. Debate on Zoom or Google Meet
  18. Plan to help a local business adapt and survive the pandemic
  19. Tutorial video on hygiene
  20. Photo essay of your community
  21. App for social distancing
  22. Editorial
  23. Letter to your future self
  24. Regulations for businesses to reopen
  25. Cost/benefit analysis

Questions? PBL and SEL Consulting?  I can be found at my blog michaelkaechele.com or @mikekaechele onTwitter.

Why I am proud of “unpresentable” projects.

In PBL we often talk about the importance of an audience to drive students to produce high quality work. But I think that we need to consider the goals for each project. I believe there is a time and place for a polished, final product and a time for more of a “rough draft,” conceptual, final product. We need to consider the learning goals behind each final product rather than judge it by how shiny it is.

A case in point was our American foreign policy monument project that we just completed. We spent five weeks on this project building up background knowledge that we will refer back to for the rest of the year. Even though we spent weeks on the project we only gave students one week to design and build their monument. We did have an authentic audience of architects, engineers, and designers come and look at the pieces while students explained them.

But the thing is, most of them weren’t pretty. They looked more like craft projects than careful designs. To be clear, I am not criticizing the students here. They did exactly what we wanted them to do. We focused very intently on symbolism and looking at American foreign policy from multiple perspectives including a non-American point of view. We were ok with designs that didn’t look perfect as long as they had some depth in symbolism to them. The picture below is a great example.

Hands for Humanity

Hands for Humanity

It is not all that impressive visually, but if only you could listen to the students who made it. It was one of my favorite pieces and the students showed a depth of understanding of how America acts in the world. Check out their artist statement:

Our monument is inspired by Greek architecture, the WWII fountain, and the 9/11 memorial. Full scale, our monument would consist of marble pedestals, granite benches, bronze inscribed plaques and bronze hands. Our proposed location will be in the Ellipse Circle, in front of the White House, where it can be a reminder to future presidents of both the triumphs and mistakes of their predecessors.  The hands in the fountains represent the US foreign policy, a fist for brutality, an offering hand for kindness, a thief hand for greed, and a hand holding a flag representing the peoples’ nationalism and America’s want to spread a democratic government. The fountain is symbolism for the US having equal parts of both the good and bad things we’ve done. Inscribed on the fountain are various quotes: (Bold emphasis mine).

You’re not supposed to be so blind with patriotism that you can’t face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who does it or says it. -Malcolm X

Maybe we ought to consider a Golden Rule in foreign policy: Don’t do to other nations what we don’t want happening to us. We endlessly bomb these countries and then we wonder why they get upset with us? -Ron Paul

Foreign policy is like human relations, only people know less about each other.   -Joe Biden

Many American pundits and foreign policy experts love to depict themselves as crusaders for human rights, but it almost always takes the form of condemning other governments, never their own. -Glenn Greenwald

We did not talk about any of these quotes in class. The students went out and found them. These students understood the nuance that we were trying to communicate that America is neither a hero or villain in the world, but a country that sometimes does great things and sometimes makes horrible mistakes.

I would argue that this “rough draft” monument is amazing, not because it looks great but because it represents a deep understanding of America’s complex relationships in the world. So rather than focus on the shiny, focus on the purpose that you have for the project.