Project-Based Learning
Project-Based Learning
1. Introduction
One of the various learning trends now applied in the educational process is project based-
learning. Besides, project-based learning is another well-liked teaching strategy in the field of
teaching English. Dewey (1938) is cited for his explanation of how teaching students via
experience will make learning more relevant and interesting. It has since evolved and is utilized
in language learning. The very definition of project based-learning is learning while working on
a project over time.
Project based-learning is one of (Pieratt, 2020) claims that PBL is a teaching method that
actively involves students in learning activities with higher motivation, curiosity, and interest
because PBL includes interesting real-world problems to solve, a challenge to design or create
something, and a way to communicate their work to others. Several studies have used PBL in the
classrooms for other learning purposes (Sirisrimangkorn, 2018; Huang, Sun 2022; Yin, 2020;
Bakar, Noordin, and Razali, 2019; Iriani, Abidin, and Safitri 2019). These studies give teachers
advice on how to implement PBL in the classroom to increase student engagement, enthusiasm,
and motivation to study and meet learning goals. In addition, PBL is aimed to improve students'
knowledge, language skills, and capacity for problem-solving when completing a task or project.
Systematic Literature Review: Project-Based Learning in English Language Teaching
In English language learning, English teachers must work to come up with innovative and
successful approaches to increase students' language ability. In practice, using English in
authentic or real-world circumstances is the ultimate goal of learning the language. Therefore, it
is recommended that project-based learning (PBL) be taken into consideration. Therefore it can
contribute to attaining the goals, particularly by improving the use of English in common speech.
Hence, this systematic literature review would explain some researches of Project Based-
Learning in English language teaching areas.
2. Literature Review
Project-based learning is one of the teaching methods that requires students to solve
problems together, create something over a period of time, and then present their work to
others. Stanley (2021), who defined PBL as a learning-based inquiry and real-world
experiences that typically entail teamwork, open-ended, needing new projects for every group
of students, and student-centered, provided a more complicated description. Furthermore,
according to Colley (2008), PBL is a concept of learning that requires students to create a
project based on a given problem in order to generate a realistic assignment.
Knowing the qualities of project-based learning is required in order to comprehend it
better. According to Stanley (2021), project based-learning has some characteristics, including
being inquiry-based, student-centered and directed, typically involving collaboration in small
groups (3-5 students) or large groups (8-12 students), involving end products that are different
for each group or student, open-ended learning, based on real-world experiences, involving
students as experts, teacher providing students' choice for nearly every component of the
project, involving end results that are different for each group or student, and being based on
real-world experiences.
With project-based learning, students are encouraged to develop problem-solving
abilities in addition to their academic knowledge. Thus, the goal of PBL is to help students
enhance their skills through engaging activities based on the project they created. Students are
given the opportunity to take part in various activities and are encouraged to conduct
investigations. Furthermore, since the project they created is applicable to the real world, it
will motivate students to exhibit their knowledge in practical ways.
In applying project based-learning, several steps are required; planning, implementing,
presenting the final product, and evaluating. First, students should think about writing a
project title, entry event, and driving question. In this step, the teacher and students will
discuss the project's theme by posing some questions. After that, each group's project title will
be created by the students. The events that will take place will then be entered. Second,
students are collaborating in groups with their peers to create the project based on the selected
topic. The teacher will keep an eye on the students' progress during this step. Then, as they
work on their assignment, the students will interact with one another. Third, they will receive
the finished product after they complete the project. Each group should give a class
presentation on their final project. Lastly, the teacher will assess the students’ work and the
process in making the project.
3. Research Methodology
This research used a systematic review method, which is a literature review based on an
explicit research question that determines, through systematic methods, which studies of the
existing literature need to be taken into account.
3.1 Data collection
Finding articles in various databases was the next stage after Project Based-Learning in
English Language Teaching was decided upon as the major theme for this SLR project. Since
they offered more similar articles than other sources, ERIC, Research Gate, and Google
Scholar were chosen for the databases. The years of publication for ERIC, Research Gate, and
Google Scholar are 2019 through 2022. The keywords were "Project Based-Learning in
English Language Teaching '' and “Project Based-Learning in English Skills”. When
searching both databases, the term "Project Based-Learning in English Language Teaching"
turned up 118,257 articles on ERIC, 100 items on Research Gate, and 520,000 articles on
Google Scholar. On the other hand, the term "Project Based-Learning in English Skills"
turned up 499,000 articles on Google Scholar, 100 items on Research Gate, and 57,081
articles on ERIC. There were 1,194,538 items in all. 200 articles were chosen after 1,194,338
irrelevant and 100 duplicate articles were found. The remaining articles were filtered with the
criteria that the articles should be addressing Project Based-Learning in English Language
Teaching and be empirical studies (research articles). The articles titles and abstracts were
assessed. Finally, 17 articles matched the search phrases. One is in Arabic and three of them
cannot be accessible, therefore thirteen items were added for the final search. See Table 1.
Search in ERIC, Table 2. Search in Research Gate, and Table.3 Search in Google Scholar.
Table 1. Search in ERIC
Keywords No Year n. Article n. Journals n.
“Project 1 2019 Improving Oral English Language Teaching
Based- Communicative
Learning Competence in
in English English Using
Language Project-Based
Teaching” Learning
Activities
Learning Using
Presentation
4 2021 Learners’ THAITESOL Journal
Perception
towards
Project-Based
Learning in
Encouraging
English Skills
Performance
21st Century
Skills
5 2022 Project-Based Research on Youth and Language
Learning in
English
Language
Teaching at a
Rural School: A
Case Study
from Turkey
as a tool. PRISMA has shown to be practical and trustworthy for determining many causes
of any events. Identification, screening, eligibility, and data inclusion are the Preferred
Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) processes, as shown
in Figure 1.
Registers (n = 1,194,538)
4. Findings
Figure 1. Flow of the diagram based
4.1 Trends in flipped classroom and ELT literature
The subcategories examined by the authors included the distribution of the studies by year,
research methods used, and the education levels of the samples in the articles.
4,5
4 4
0 4
0
3,5
3 3
0
2,5
2 2
0
1,5
0,5
0
2019 2020 2021 2022
Figure 4 reveals that the vast majority of articles (53%) selected university students as the
sample, followed by EFL and ESL learners with various backgrounds (39%), and the last
one is teachers (8%).
8%
Teachers
5. Discussion
In this research, 13 articles retrieved from ERIC, Research Gate, and Google Scholar were
analyzed in terms of their trends and findings. Hence, there were several points taken from
those articles in the discussions: English language teaching, oral communicative competence,
critical thinking skills, English skills, speaking skills, and writing skills and ability.
5.1 English Language Teaching
The article entitled Project-Based Learning in English Language Teaching at A Rural School:
A Case Study from Turkey (Kemaloglu-Er, E., and Sahin, M.T., 2022) discussed about the
use of Project-Based Learning (PBL) in English Language Teaching (ELT) at a rural school.
Teaching at a rural school may get some challenges, such as inappropriate resources and lack
of students’ interest. Therefore, this case study is aimed to design a PBL model for the
English classes at a rural school and explore the effects of PBL on the development of
linguistic and nonlinguistic competences as well as the advantages and obstacles of the
process along with recommended solutions. The findings showed that PBL has a multifaceted
impact on students' growth. According to the research, PBL helped the students' interest in
and comfort with using English as well as their English language ability. Also, it was
discovered that the students had improved their real-world related skills, such as time
management, creativity, independent judgment, oral presentation, and computer use. Yet,
PBL was also described as a difficult procedure demanding complete dedication and a
significant workload. According to this study, PBL can be a useful tool for raising ELT
standards in rural schools.
find out how using project-based learning activities helped those students learn English more
effectively and develop 21st century abilities. Several studies have demonstrated the positive
effects of implementing PBL in a classroom. Through the project process, which typically
begins with identifying questions, students in a PBL classroom have the chance to acquire
both academic knowledge and life skills. Besides, real-world subjects are used to motivate
students to engage in realistic work with the application of interdisciplinary skills and real-life
knowledge in a PBL classroom. The result of this research was the majority of participants
stated that project-based learning activities helped them enhance their level of responsibility
in learning while also encouraging collaboration and teamwork skills. Furthermore, the
students expressed satisfaction with the PBL integration in the English learning class. Then,
PBL integration in a classroom, in general, enables students to achieve significant objectives
and get over some learning challenges.
Sayuti, H.A.M., et al., (2020) in their article entitled Using Gold Project Based Learning for
Intermediate Year Three Pupils to Enhance English Speaking Skill: A Conceptual Paper.
Project-based learning (PBL) is one of the teaching strategies that enhances students'
performance in the classroom, according to numerous previous research. One of the benefits
is to enhance pupils' English speaking skill. Besides, PBL can help students develop higher
order thinking skills to think critically and beyond the way of pupils' thinking. The primary
goal of the study is to determine how the students' speaking abilities in English are affected by
the use of Gold Standard Project-Based Learning (GSPBL). Furthermore, this research needed
to compare students' English speaking performance before and after the use of GSPBL. The
researcher used observation, interview and documents as data collection tools. The results of
this study was to help English teachers by providing them with the tools, which they need to
implement GSPBL in the classroom more successfully. As GSPBL was introduced and put
into practice as a classroom exercise, it appears that the students could also improve their
English language speaking Open Access skill.
The article written by Sirisrimangkorn, L., (2021) entitled Improving learners’ speaking skills
through Project-Based Learning using presentation. Many Thai students have difficulties in
communication skills, especially speaking skills. It is suggested that the students can improve
their English proficiency by engaging in activities and picking up tips from one another.
There have been numerous initiatives to encourage students to practice speaking skills in
order to improve their ability to communicate in English. Learners are encouraged to study
English and hone their language skills using a variety of activities and techniques. To advance
the language learning and advancement of EFL learners, project-based learning is included
into a variety of language education methods. To fulfill the goal of the university, project-
based learning has been integrated into the curriculum so as to enhance learners' speaking
ability and serves as a communicative environment for English speaking practice. The
purpose of this study was to look at how project-based instruction using presentations affected
the speaking abilities of EFL undergraduate students. The researcher found that the students
expressed positive opinions towards project-based learning using presentation as it was
perceived to have helped improve their speaking skills. The findings from the interviews
revealed that the project-based learning using presentation was positive for learners' speaking
skills according to their presentation tasks, scaffolding activities, and practice of integrative
skills.
The research conducted by Huang, H., and Sun, C., (2022), entitled Exploring the
Effectiveness of Project-Based Learning on Speaking Test Performance, is aimed at
investigating how well the PBL teaching strategy improves students' oral fluency, vocabulary,
grammar, and pronunciation from the standpoint of band descriptors in the IELTS Speaking
Exam, an international English proficiency test. The results show that the project learning
process has improved all four speaking band descriptors—fluency and coherence, lexical
resource, grammatical range and correctness, coupled with pronunciation—though fluency
and lexical resource have seen a greater improvement than grammar and pronunciation. Also,
students typically approach learning with a more optimistic outlook and participate more
actively in speaking activities.
determines students' ability and success in learning English. However, among the four English
language abilities, writing is one that students find difficult to grasp, according to early
observations made at a study program for English education where researchers teach. Some
factors that cause students' difficulties in writing an English essay are lack of understanding of
the topic, the purpose of writing, and how to organize ideas into writing. In order to help the
students enhance their writing skills and originality, a solution to the issues mentioned above
is required. In this study, students' writing focuses on narrative essays by using Project-based
learning. Project-based learning can help the students enhancing their English language
abilities. Hence, the purpose of this study is to determine whether project-based learning can
help students in higher education in improving their writing skills and creativity. Furthermore,
it also tries to explore students' perceptions towards the implementation of project-based
learning in writing course. The findings of this study suggested that project-based learning
can assist students in developing their ability and creativity in writing narrative text in a
variety of areas, including their understanding of the topic and their knowledge of the
narrative genre, specifically social function, text structure, and language feature.
The article entitled “Project-based learning: promoting EFL learners’ writing skills” by
Aghayani, B., and Hajmohammadi, E., (2019) discussed about the effect of project-based
learning on EFL learners’ writing skill. Several researches found that PBL has some benefits
in learning, such as a study by Fragoulis and Tsiplakides (2009) that found that PBL provides
learners with a variety of advantages, including chances to grow their self-assurance, self-
esteem, autonomy, cooperative skills, motivation, and language proficiency. More
significantly, PBL activities increase students' language proficiency, foster their attitudes
about learning in EFL classrooms Artini et al., (2018), and increase their enthusiasm to use
EFL with a strong emphasis on writing ability Kovalyova, Soboleva, & Kerimkulov, (2016).
Hence, PBL not only can foster learners' critical thinking for learning, but also assisting them
in learning new information might be crucial in boosting writing. Due to the important role of
writing in language learning, this study attempted to show the effect of PBL on EFL learners'
writing skill. The result of this study showed that project-based learning significantly
improved the learners' writing skills. The results also demonstrated that project-based learning
strategies do help students improve and promote their writing skills in a collaborative setting.
Sa’diyah, I.H., and Cahyono, B.Y., (2019) conducted the research entitled Effect of Project-
Based Learning through blogging on EFL students’ writing ability. Writing is regarded as a
productive skill, and writing exercises result in written work during the EFL learning process.
Writing also becomes an essential talent at the university level. Since it can be difficult for
them to explore and arrange thoughts, as well as come up with suitable words for writing,
students sometimes have a tendency to be hesitant during the writing process. Further, the
students' mother tongues, in this case Indonesian and English, differ in terms of their cultural
backgrounds, which presents another difficulty for them when writing. An efficient approach
to teaching writing is recommended to be used to increase EFL students' writing proficiency
in order to assist them in overcoming the difficulties. Blogging is the term used to describe
the actions taken by bloggers while they are writing or expressing their ideas on their blogs. It
makes it possible for students to maintain online journals, especially for writing exercises.
Due to the requirement for students to create blogs, the learner blog is the subject of the study.
Therefore, this research is aimed at investigating the effect of using PBL through blogging on
students’ writing abilities and finding out the differences between students’ writing ability
who has high and low self-efficacy and. The research used an experimental research design in
which there are two classes: an experimental group that applies PBL through blogging and a
control group that uses a conventional method. The results showed that students using PBL
through blogging performed better on writing assignments than those using the conventional
method. It was also discovered that there was no significant different in writing skills
between students using PBL who had high self-efficacy and those who had low self-efficacy.
The study conducted by Alotaibi, M.G., (2020), which entitled The Effect of Project-Based
Learning Model on Persuasive Writing Skills of Saudi EFL Secondary School Students
discussed about how students’ persuasive writing skills is affected by using project-based
learning model. This study was conducted because of many students have problems in
writing, so the researchers suggested to use one of learning model, which is project based
learning. It is a learning model that may help students improving their writing abilities, and
encourages students to use reflective thinking. Especially, this study focused on examining
students’ persuasive writing skills. The main objective of this study is to explore the effect of
project-based learning on persuasive writing skills with a group of third-grade of secondary
school students. The design of the study was quasi-experimental approach using pre and
posttest for control and experimental groups. While the control group received conventional
teaching method, the experimental group received project-based teaching method. All
participants were tested using the pre/post persuasive writing performance test before and
after the intervention. The result indicate that there was a significant difference between the
experimental group's mean posttest scores and those of the control group in favor of the
experimental group. It was concluded that participants' level of persuasive writing
performance considerably developed after obtaining the explicit project-based learning model.
6. Conclusion
As a result, this research has covered a number of research topics related to Project-
Based Learning, particularly in English Language Teaching, including oral communicative
competence, critical thinking skills, English skills, speaking skills and abilities, and writing
skills and abilities. The researchers carried up an overview study on those subjects, which was
referenced in ERIC, research gate and google scholar. The following study is suggested to
focus on one of those subjects, however it will be explored in more detail and employ
additional resources between the years 2019 until 2023.
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