Develop ATL Skills Through The MYP Personal Project

What is self-regulation?

According to Pintrich and Zusho (2002), self-regulated learning is an active constructive process whereby learners set goals for their learning and monitor, regulate, and control their cognition, motivation, and behaviour, guided and constrained by their goals and the contextual features of the environment. The MYP Personal Project provides a great opportunity for students to develop self-regulation and metacognition, which prepares them for the Diploma Programme study and lifelong learning.

In the context of the MYP personal project, self-regulated learners exercise their agency; set personal learning goals to acquire knowledge and skills; demonstrate their consolidation of their learning through making a product. Throughout the personal project making process, students identify and practice strategies to develop their approaches to learning skills and make strategic steps to achieve their personal project goals. In the process of completing their personal project, they monitor their engagement, reflect on what worked and what did not work, and make adjustments of their actions accordingly. To achieve the desired outcomes, students will need to identify what approaches to learning (ATL) skills are required and what new learning strategies can help them achieve their goals. I think this is where students can benefit significantly from the supervisor’s guidance. We should not assume that MYP Year 5 students have all the necessary skills and learning strategies. The conversation about what skills might help you (the student) in achieving the learning goal(s) and product goal(s) must be deliberate. Although they are MYP Year 5 students, it doesn’t mean all their subject teachers have explicitly taught them ATL skills and provided them with specific strategies to develop particular ATL skills.  

Personal Project Objectives & ATL Skills (2021)

In the new MYP personal project guide (2021), students select the most appropriate ATL skills for each stage of their project. Previously, students were required to demonstrate specific ATL skills specified by the MYP at each stage of the process. I believe this new change will further empower students to monitor and control cognition, motivation and behavior in order to achieve their personal project goal. In the student-supervisor meetings, it is important to ask students in each stage what skills they would like to apply or practice to reach their goal. Help them to visualize what it looks like when they demonstrate the skill and what examples might be included. Even better, guide students to elaborate on what IB learner profile attribute they will demonstrate by applying specific ATL skills.

Here are some examples of how ATL skills might be applied in different stages of completing the personal project:

In the planning phase:

Here is the poster that I have created to support the student-supervisor conversation. Click the image to download the PDF version.

Reference

Pintrich, P. R., & Zusho, A. (2002). The development of academic self-regulation: The role of cognitive and motivational factors. In A. Wigfield & J. S. Eccles (Eds.), Development of achievement motivation (pp. 249– 284). San Diego, CA: Academic.