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PBL Miriam College

<div><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1785401137429pbl-faculty.jpg" class="fr-fic fr-dib" style="width:957.995px;height:auto" width="957.995"/>Under PBL, gone are the days of teacher-centered learning instead teachers become facilitators, guiding students in the projects and topics they want to pursue in classInside a classroom in Miriam College, Senior Year High School students are busy working on a clay model of their ideal school chair. Sky’s the limit in their design idea but not without going through a process that answers the driving question: “How might we redesign or improve our classroom chairs to better support students’ comfort, learning, and well-being?”</div>First, students working in groups have to explore different design possibilities through research, illustrations, and prototypes. All sorts of results came up from the task, from a design that looked like an airline business class seat, to a spaceship, and a Lazy Boy. One group argued that there’s nothing broken with the current chair design “so why fix it?” They too presented their points.Interestingly, this is an English class covering a lesson on argumentation. Instead of a one-sided lecture about the topic at hand, the teacher made it experiential, flexible, and collaborative—all necessarily skills for 21st century learning.  <div>Student voice and choice in the classroom</div>“The traditional way of learning is teacher-centered, where the only source of information would be the teacher. There is no student voice or choice,” says Miriam College Vice President for Academic Affairs Dr. Trixie Marie Sison, who led efforts in introducing Project-Based Learning (PBL) to the school as early as 2009 until it was formalized in 2015.PBL grounds a lesson on an &quot;essential question&quot; or problem that reflects the students’ realities, preferred topic, and communities they live in. They are then assessed in every step of the process to find a solution to the problem, which becomes their &quot;project&quot; that will ultimately be presented in front of the class. This is a shift in the way students are perceived and taught. Through the approach, students are not seen as passive recipients of information but as individuals who are engaged, committed, and responsible in deepening their own learning.“PBL tries to connect theories with application, and the application is not easily tested in an exam,” says Miriam College High School Principal Sofia De Guzman. She adds, “Through PBL, students are able to see a problem or topic in its entirety.” And because it allows interdisciplinary collaboration where the same project may be pursued under different subjects, it levels the playing fields for all students. So, say a project about whether an existing classroom chair needs to be redesigned or not may be covered in an English class focusing on argumentation but, at the same time, may also be discussed in a Math class tackling measurements, or an Arts or Engineering class that’s learning about design or ergonomics. “Yung magagaling sa Math, Science, Arts, Humanities, and Business, lahat sila may chance na mag excel in this learning approach,” adds De Guzman.<div><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1785401765248SCIENCE2.jpg" class="fr-fic fr-dib"/>With PBL, teachers from different subject areas collaborate to tackle one project under different disciplines such as math, science, and English. The projects, some of which can be prototypes demonstrating a solution to a problem, are then displayed in yearly exhibits to make students’ learning experiences more meaningful and their outputs more tangible.</div><div>From problem to real-world solutions </div>Adapted from the Buck Institute for Education, PBL has seven essential project design elements. It starts with a &quot;driving/essential question&quot; that tackles a real-world problem. In an all girls’ school like Miriam College, questions like &quot;Should the school become co-educational?&quot; may have more relevance to their student life than, say, weighing in on the pros and cons of the Death Penalty.  Once a driving question is established, it is followed by &quot;sustained inquiry,&quot; &quot;authenticity,&quot; and &quot;student voice and choice&quot; all of which veer from passive listening. These processes allow students to be critical thinkers and investigators, giving them the agency to actively search for concrete, innovative, and real-world solutions through a tangible project while teachers serve as guides.Lastly, &quot;reflection,&quot; &quot;critique and revision,&quot; and &quot;public product&quot; become essential strategies for a high-quality project or solution. This stage allows students to connect their’ inputs with the bigger picture. Their solutions are then validated by critique from peers or feedback from teachers or experts. Once they get feedback and apply it in their project, they will be more confident in the final step which is presenting it to the public.  Since 2015, Miriam College has applied the PBL approach across all its units, from the pre-school to the College. “With the Basic Education, the faculty is more involved in guiding the students through the process. At the college level, it’s really the students who do everything since they are more mature and have more networks. But, in both levels, dapat malakas ang student voice and choice,” says Dr. Sison.  <div>Localizing PBL through Laro, Likha, Linang</div>To adapt PBL in the context of the College and localize the approach, it looked towards its own Henry Sy, Sr. Innovation Center (HSSIC). The Center came up with an educational framework called Laro, Likha, Linang (Play, Create, Enhance). Laro allows students to ask, engage, and try without failure; Likha involves the process of building and developing a project while exposing students to new experiences that are both challenging and fulfilling; while Linang is an opportunity to receive feedback and gain deeper knowledge about their project before they ultimately share their output to a wider audience. In Miriam College, there is a caveat in this final stage especially for major projects: it has to have an impact on a community.Citing an example at the pre-school, Dr. Sison, who used to be the principal of the unit where PBL was first applied, shares that a lesson about whales through a talk by a marine biologist and a field trip to a popular marine park in the metro ended up with the pupils writing to the park management telling them that “whales and big marine animals should not be contained in aquariums.” At the High School, students experimented on building a boat out of used mineral bottles and tested its usability in the campus’ swimming pool. After testing it successfully, the students then donated the boats to a partner barangay where flooding is common. Under the approach, students become more conscientious because it has to benefit a community,” says Dr. Sison.<div>Changing mindsets</div>From the classroom, the most innovative projects get highlighted in the school’s yearly President’s Challenge event organized by the HSSIC. Students from pre-school to College present their work before an external panel of judges. “We have students who could create Apps, virtual reality platforms, and who could think of solutions to problems that can help a community,&quot; explains HSSIC’s Innovation Resource Manager Cristina Ibañez. “From solving simple to complex problems at a young age, kaya na nila.”<div><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1785401380968pre-school.jpg" class="fr-fic fr-dib"/>Pre-schoolers present a pop-up storybook titled, “Tiny Heroes of the Concrete Jungle” to teach other children the benefits of different garden vegetables. With PBL, students as young as five or six learn how to come up solutions to real-world problems. </div>Even after a decade of implementing PBL, the school still continues to fine tune the approach. “Hindi mo kasi ma pe-perfect yung implementation in just a few years. It has to be continuously practiced. Even among teachers, there has to be a change in mindset,” says Dr. Sison. In lieu of the usual exams, students now have a say in their final output whether it’s a product, service, position paper, or policy paper.<div><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1785401558467Nuvali.jpg" class="fr-fic fr-dib"/>High School students from Miriam College Nuvali present their final PBL output before a panel of judges during the school’s President’s Challenge, an annual cross-level innovation competition. </div>Where teachers used to work in silos, they now have to collaborate with other teachers so one project may be tackled under different subjects. “We used to regard subjects as separate, where areas like Language has nothing to do with Social Studies but everything is connected because that’s how our brain thinks. It looks for connections. This way, learning becomes meaningful and more interesting,” says Dr. Sison.PBL is turning teaching and learning as we know it on its head. Applying it and even localizing it is a challenge to an educational system so used to the traditional ways of teaching and learning. But, for Miriam College, this is what it means to actually prepare students for the real world. ”They become independent. They know how to ask questions, they know what they want, they know how to do things and how to solve problems on their own. More importantly, they learn what it means to serve a community,” concludes Dr. Sison.

Miriam College’s Project-Based Learning approach shifts students from passive listeners to active problem-solvers, encouraging collaboration, critical thinking, and real-world solutions through projects grounded in authentic questions.

Miriam College’s Project-Based Learning approach shifts students from passive listeners to active problem-solvers, encouraging collaboration, critical thinking, and real-world solutions through projects grounded in authentic questions.

How Project-Based Learning is changing the way students learn at Miriam College

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How Project-Based Learning is changing the way students learn at Miriam College

Dahl D. Bennett

Published July 30, 2026 05:05 PM PHT

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Project Based Learning

Miriam College

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