Personal Project FAQs
Why do I have to do the Personal Project?
The Personal Project is a mandatory project in the Middle Years Programme. It is an opportunity to explore a topic that is of interest to you, to develop your approaches to learning (ATL) skills further and to create something unique to you. It is a way to consolidate and showcase the learning you’ve done over the 5 years in the MYP.
Will anyone help me do the project?
You are responsible for your Personal Project. It is an investigation that you do alone to show your skills as an independent learner.
However, you are not entirely alone in doing the project. You will be assigned a teacher supervisor who will be available to offer you advice and guidance as and when you might need it. Your teacher supervisor can do a number of things to help you in the process including:
- Advising you on whether or not you are undertaking an achievable project
- Helping you to create and follow a schedule for completing the project
- Discussing your global context and topic to ensure they complement each other
- Meeting to discuss and review your progress with your project
- Advising you should any part of your project start to present difficulties
Being an independent learner does not mean you have to work in isolation. In fact the best independent learners recognize how important it is to collaborate with other people when undertaking a project because a wider range of ideas can lead to a better outcome. Apart from your teacher supervisor, you will talk with and seek advice from your parents, friends and other adults. However, the work you do in the project must be your own work.
So, what is the Personal Project?
The Personal Project is the major interdisciplinary project you do to show that you are an effective independent learner with the range of necessary skills to be ready to progress to the next stage of your learning. You have to complete and submit a Personal Project during the final year of the Middle Years Programme.
What exactly do I have to create for the Personal Project?
- use many of the approaches to learning (ATL) skills you have learned in your other subjects
- produce items
- undergo assessment
- complete your investigation through the lens of one Global Context
- work independently throughout the course
- interact with an teacher supervisor whose role is to provide guidance and advice only
- A process journal (similar to the developmental workbook in arts)
- A product or outcome for display that shows other people what you did
- A project report (1,500 to 3,500 words, or 13-15 minutes in oral/visual format)
What is a Process Journal?
Your process journal is the record of your involvement in the Personal Project process. It should record all your ideas, your planning, your discussions, clippings of readings and concepts, diary excerpts, meeting schedules and outcomes with your supervisor, photographs – whatever you do that is part of the process should be kept in this document.
The process journal can be in any form that best suites your style of working. It can be electronic, kept in a notebook or 3-ring binder, or simply an organized collection of work.
What do I have to “do” or “make”?
The product you create is how you show other people what you have investigated. Apart from your process journal, which will be part of your expo display, you need to have some way of showing what you produced or achieved for your goal. This might be the actual product such as a model, electronic article, artwork or it might be visuals of the outcome such as photographs of an event you organized.
Do I have to write anything to go along with the Product?
Yes. The report you produce can be in different formats; it can be written, oral or in multi-media form. You will need to think carefully about how you report your project and how you work best. To prepare an oral report will take as long to prepare as a written report.