Genius Hour

Genius hour is when students spend time during the school day exploring their own interests. Students decide upon a project and work towards their end products in the provided amount of time. Depending on the setting and available time from the teacher, this could be one hour a day, an hour a week, or whenever it is able to fit in the schedule. They key benefit of genius hour is that students are in control. They decide upon the topic of interest, the method of research, and final presentation product. When students have this type of decision power, they are far more motivated to succeed. And because it is a topic they care about, they will be practicing proper research, citations, and other ELA aspects while doing something they want to do. To bring the project to an end, students will present their final project to an appropriate audience. This could be the class, where they then can benefit from the information others in the class researched. Students may also find more appropriate audiences based on their topic. If their project was on recycling in the community, city officials may be a more authentic audience.

Some potential setbacks that may arise while implementing genius hour could include the inability to select a project. Some students may not have a passion that they are drawn to immediately. A good way to address this is to have some topics that could be provided for those students to select from. Providing some examples of final work could also be a spark of inspiration. I have also addressed this setback by having small group talk time. This allows students to share their ideas and finalize their selection process. Another setback that could occur is that some students may take advantage of the class time provided and use it as social time or personal time. Teachers need to be direct about the requirements of the project and actively monitor during the work time. A general time frame should be established from the start to ensure that students are reaching at least the bare minimum each session.

From a student thinking mind, I would have loved the opportunity to complete a genius hour project. I have all sorts of ideas running through my head for the projects I could have completed. As a teacher, I can see the ability to get to know my students and their interests. Students are still practicing skills I need them to know, and they are enjoying the work they are doing. This bit of self-guided learning could greatly improve the productivity in the content driven learning.