Highlight on Genius Hour

We are incorporating an exciting new activity in our classes this year. Genius Hour has been around for several years, first appearing in companies like Google, as a way to increase employee productivity. The idea is that when employees are working on something they are passionate about, they will work harder and create a better product. In education, this concept is used to help students learn to plan, research, and experiment while learning about a topic that interests them. For example, we have a student at Revolutionary Learning who will study the paths of local migratory birds while discovering the reasons they stay in different locations throughout the year. She will identify flocks of birds she has witnessed flying over our area and determine which species migrate and which remain year round. Research skills, dichotomous key usage, mapping, and public speaking are things that will improve during the course of this project.

Other project topics chosen by our students range from recreating period clothing, exploring why dinosaurs went extinct, and an in depth study of the works of Shakespeare. Poster boards, speeches, a monologue performance, and dioramas of historical buildings are all things we look forward to seeing as our students work through their chosen projects. There is no timeline for our learners to complete their projects, and as soon as they are finished, they may choose another topic that excites them and begin the process again.