From Ideas to Solutions: How Students Can Solve Real-World Problems

As a former yearbook advisor for over 20+ years, I have seen firsthand how real-world challenges, student voice and choice, collaboration, and future-ready skills can motivate students and make learning deeply relevant. Challenge Based Learning (CBL) brings together all of these elements in a meaningful way.

I was first introduced to CBL at an Apple Distinguished Educator Institute, and the process immediately resonated with me. The CBL framework empowers students to think of something they would like to take action on, learn about that issue, and then think of a way to solve the problem.  As teachers, this instructional approach makes learning meaningful and engages students with real-world, relevant issues. When this was showcased at the Institute, I knew that it would be really meaningful for students and well-received.  Originally developed by Apple, CBL is now widely embraced by schools as well as organizations that create educational content.

One of the most exciting and inspiring implementations of CBL comes through Discovery Education’s Young Scientist Challenge.  Each year, this national competition invites students ages 10-14 to engage in each step of the CLB process as they solve authentic, real-world problems.  I have had the privilege of serving as a first-round judge on several occasions, and I can say first hand this process allows students to showcase solutions to authentic, real-world problems.  It is truly inspiring to see what young adults invent and find solutions to.  The sophistication of projects, real world connections, creativity and indepth thinking is incredible. 

I believe that challenge based learning can be applied to every content area and every grade level.  Here is the overall premise of Challenge Based Learning and how you can go about implementing it.

The Big Idea

Every school, classroom or community has challenges waiting to be solved.  These challenges might connect to the environment, such as finding more ways to recycle, or they might relate to technology, health, or even how we treat one another.  This big idea will spark curiosity and is one that students should spend some time brainstorming and thinking about.

The Essential Question

The essential question takes the big idea and focuses on something more specific to pursue.  It generally is open-ended, and consists of something that needs to be investigated.  For example if the big idea is recycling, the essential question might be, “How can we get everyone in our school to recycle and be more efficient in doing so?”

The Challenge

This is where you come up with a plan to implement.  Using the same recycling idea, the challenge might be to increase awareness on how to recycle.  Maybe students are not aware of what can be recycled and the process to do so.

Guiding Questions and Activities

In this stage students will break down the questions further and research, interview people, and investigate.  In the recycling example, they might collect data, conduct interviews or survey people to get a better understanding of the issue. This step is critical as students should not go on their assumptions.  We want students to really understand the issue before they plan or implement a solution. 

Solutions and Implementation

After they have collected data, researched, interviewed people and investigated aspects of the issue, they will now design and implement real world solutions.  In the recycling example, they might decide to have a student ambassador at the spot where students drop off their lunch trays or throw away their food to educate them.  They might create some public service announcements for their school to air or meet with the custodial staff to find the most effective way to manage the recycling efforts.

Evaluation and Reflection

In this stage the students will evaluate if what they implemented has had any effect.  Are the recycling efforts improving?  Are more students and staff aware of how to recycle and the importance of recycling?  They might once again need to conduct interviews, survey individuals or make observations.

Publish/Sharing

I think one of the most important steps in the process is to showcase and share the results. This makes the process really authentic and meaningful for the students.  They see their hard work showcased.  Results could be published in the school newsletter, local paper or even recognized at a school assembly.

No matter the challenge, students are more engaged and motivated when they take part in this process.  They feel valued and invested, often putting in more time into this project than any other one that they do.  To provide them with an authentic real-world experience from start to finish, and one that they are passionate about can deepen learning in so many ways.

To close, I would like to share an inspiring example.  Last year’s Young Scientist Challenge was won by an 8th grade student, just 13 years of age. This brilliant student created a method to detect pesticide residue on consumable produce using an AI based handheld detector.  Although this invention is incredible, what is even more inspiring is that when young individuals are given the opportunity, support and encouragement to tackle real-world challenges, they can find remarkable solutions and do extraordinary things.  I invite you to read the story of Sirish.

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