This past workshop at Patiño School of Innovation focused on one core goal: helping teachers design authentic, high-quality Project-Based Learning experiences. We used AI as a collaborative planning partner, not to generate finished projects, but to accelerate thinking, surface stronger driving questions, refine enduring understandings, sequence milestones, and pressure-test authenticity and rigor.
The posters that emerged from the session show clear evidence that the process worked. Across grades and content areas, the plans already contain many of the hallmarks of strong PBL: meaningful local connections, interdisciplinary framing, student voice and choice, public products with real audiences, and intentional formative assessment and revision cycles.
Here is a summary of the project ideas teachers developed:
Culture, Identity & Storytelling
- Illustrated Cookbook Zine (English 1)
Students explore how people build and share culture through food, stories, and arts. The driving question centers on preserving culture through a personal recipe, memory, or story “that only we can tell.” The public product is a cookbook zine shared at Fresno Lit Hop. - “Mi Familia Emprendedora”
Students examine personal identity, family routines, and cultural traditions as the foundation for a fictional business idea. Work moves from identity and family-tree mapping into Spanish-language business profiles and a commercial pitch (audio/video/music options).
Entrepreneurship + Local Challenges
- Can Your Business Grow Without Breaking the System? (9th grade – Biology, Entrepreneurship, ELA, Math)
Built around systems thinking and carrying-capacity concepts, students design Central Valley businesses that grow while respecting local resource limits. The culminating product is a sustainable venture pitch presented at a public showcase night. - Fresno Heat Project (9th grade – interdisciplinary with English, Math, History, CTE)
Students identify real heat-related problems in Fresno and design sustainable solutions for specific customers. The public product is a pitch before a judge panel and audience, with clear milestones for empathy work, solution design, validation, and business-model development. - Wellness Innovation (10th grade PE)
Students turn a student-facing health or wellness challenge into an entrepreneurial opportunity. Products include a business model, user-feedback data, impact plan, and prototype or MVP.
History, Opportunity & Civic Agency
- Future Opportunity Venture Pitch (9th Modern World History)
Students investigate historical conflicts and their long-term consequences, then design ventures (business, nonprofit, or community initiative) that create value from those lasting effects in Fresno and the Central Valley. - Civil Rights Community Innovation Pitch (11th US History)
Anchored in HSS 11.10, students analyze barriers to opportunity in the Central Valley and apply lessons from the civil rights movement to design innovative solutions. The public product is a community innovation pitch and showcase. - American Dream Policy & Action Brief (11th ELA + INC)
Students examine the responsibility entrepreneurs have in defending and redefining the American Dream in the Central Valley. Work culminates in a policy and action brief, with strong formative checkpoints around empathy, opportunity analysis, and defense protocols.
Science, Media & Documentary
- What’s That Material? (10th grade Chemistry)
Students use the periodic table as a predictive model to select materials for products that solve real Central Valley problems. The product is a materials start-up pitch that includes scientific justification, prototypes, and stakeholder presentation. - Social Media Campaign Portfolio (Grades 11–12 Media)
Students synthesize market research, audience insights, and performance data to design and defend digital marketing strategies for Fresno small businesses. The public product is a professional client presentation delivered as a video. - “Dear Gov” Documentary Video Project (10th ELA)
Students use documentary filmmaking to celebrate people, objects, events, or places that make California unique. Short films are shared through the CA Writing Project “Dear Gov” initiative and other public platforms.
What Stands Out
Across the set, several high-quality PBL characteristics appear consistently:
- Local authenticity — Nearly every project is rooted in Fresno or the Central Valley.
- Public products with real audiences — pitches, exhibitions, Lit Hop, client presentations, policy briefs, and documentary sharing.
- Interdisciplinary potential — science + entrepreneurship, history + venture design, PE + business, language + identity.
- Clear scaffolding — most posters include sequenced milestones and formative assessment points.
- Student agency — driving questions invite genuine problem-solving and personal connection rather than predetermined answers.
These are still early drafts, of course. The real power will come as teachers refine the projects with their students, strengthen content rigor, and build in deeper feedback and revision cycles. But the foundation is strong. Teachers left the workshop with coherent, ambitious starting points that already reflect the intentional design process we practiced together—using AI as a thought partner while keeping human judgment, local knowledge, and educational values at the center.
I’m looking forward to seeing how these ideas grow once they meet real students.
About the Author: Jenny
