PP Guide for MYP students

PERSONAL PROJECT
STUDENTS’ GUIDE
"Shirakatsy Lyceum"
International Scientific Educational Complex
The International Baccalaureate Diploma
Programme
9/28/2017 By Mrs. Mariam Ohanyan

The Personal Project is an independent assignment that can be on any topic and
take any form as long as it has a strong connection to one Area of Interaction. If
you choose the right Personal Project, it will give you the opportunity to share with
others something that is important to you, and it will be an exciting and rewarding
experience.
It is your project that demonstrates the skills you have developed over the years in
the Middle Years Program (MYP). The Personal Project holds a special place of
importance in the MYP, as it is a culminating even which is completed in the final
year of the program (Grade 10).
You will be working on your project over the course of many months, so be sure
you pick a topic in which you have a strong interest or genuine curiosity. The
project will consist of the actual project, the process journal that documents your
ideas and work throughout the project, and the personal report which will be
summarize your overall experience.
WHAT IS THE PERSONAL PROJECT?

WHAT SORT OF PERSONAL PROJECT CAN I DO?
• The possibilities are infinite! As long as you can take your topic and
connect it to an Area of Interaction – and you’ve shown a vested interest
in developing or learning more about your topic, you can run with it!
Some examples of Personal Projects from the 2011-2012 MYP Students:
• Participate in and help organize a walk for Autism
• Create a scrapbook of mentors and role models for young teens
• Create a website to inform people of the use of subliminal messaging
• Create a music video to inform students to rise above the influence of
peer pressure
• Paint a mural to depict diversity and respect
• Inform people about the reality of domestic abuse through an interpretive
dance
• Teach parent to play the piano who has no prior piano playing experience
Again, the possibilities are endless!

EACH PROJECT MUST:
• Have a clear and achievable goal -- including specifications for
the goal
• Be entirely your own work
• Be focused on one Area of Interaction
• Be personal – reflect your unique interests, abilities, and/or
concerns
• Be the result of your initiative, creativity, and ability to organize
and plan
• Address a topic to which you are truly committed

YOUR PERSONAL PROJECT IS NOT…
• An essay.
• A part of class work completed in another class.
• So large that it destroys your academic and social
life!
• A group activity – but it can involve others as long as
it is your project.
• Too large in size – meaning, your project should not
be “How to Solve America’s Financial Crisis”.

MYP AREAS OF INTERACTION
• Community and Service
• Health and Social Education
• Human Ingenuity
• Environments
• Approaches to Learning

COMMUNITY AND SERVICE
• This Area of Interaction allows you to become aware of your role and
responsibility as a member of your community and encourages
responsible and caring participation within. Through firsthand experience,
you have an opportunity to learn how your community functions and how
other people live while contributing something of benefit to society.
Some skills, attitudes, and values developed through Community and Service
include:
• Awareness of how communities are created
• Awareness of how communities function
• Appreciation for different cultures
• Sensitivity to the needs of the community and society
• Sense of responsibility and self-esteem

Source:http://cartoonworks.com/rw/images/thumbnails/community%20sevice.jpg

HEALTH AND SOCIAL EDUCATION
• This Area of Interaction encourages you to prepare for a
physically and mentally healthy life and to become aware of
potential health hazards. You are challenged to explore
personal, physical, and societal issues related to personal
health and the health of society. Some skills, attitudes, and
values developed through Health and Social Education
include:
• A respect for your body and mind
• The ability to make responsible choices for yourself physically
and mentally
• Raising awareness of social issues and their effects on the
health and well-being of others

ENVIRONMENTS
This Area of Interaction encourages you to consider
environments as a whole – meaning what surrounds you – this
could be as small as the chair you sit it all the way up to the
planet we live on! You will come to an appreciation and
understanding of your and other’s effect on the environments
from our day-to-day lives.
Some skills, attitudes, and values developed through
Environments include:
• Conservation – a respect for the environment as a whole
• Responsibility for the natural world
• Respect for the areas where we interact – buildings, nature,
virtual etc.

HUMAN INGENUITY
This Area of Interaction encourages you to examine and reflect on the
ingenious ways in which we as humans think, create, and initiate change. You
are encouraged to consider the impact of human creations on society and on
the mind. You become driven to appreciate the initiative humans have to
transform, enjoy, and improve the quality of life over time.
Some skills, attitudes, and values developed through Human Ingenuity
include:
• Studying the human ability invent, create, change, and improve
• Examining the causes and effects of change
• Significant cultural and historical movements
• Mathematical and scientific thought through the ages

APPROACHES TO LEARNING
This Area of Interaction enables you to take responsibility for your own
learning. You will acquire skills, attitudes, and practices to become a
successful learner. You become concerned with the development of
effective study, of critical, coherent, and independent thought, and of
the capacity for solving problems and making decisions.
Some skills, attitudes, and values developed through Approaches to
Learning include:
• Organizational skills, study practices, and a positive attitude
towards learning
• Collaborative skills
• Problem solving and thinking skills
• Reflection on learning and revision of methods

BACKWARD PLANNING AND SCHEDULING YOUR
PERSONAL PROJECT
Try the following steps to organize the steps you need to
complete a successful project:
1. Create a calendar on a piece of poster board or on the
computer that begins with today’s date and ends in March when
your project should be completed.
2. In your process journal, brainstorm all the things that need to
be done to complete the project: interviews, appointments,
book/internet research, rehearsals, phone calls, film editing,
anything and everything that will go into completing the project.

3. Using this list, fill in your calendar with action items for
each week. Obviously, some items need to take place
before others, but you might also have to start some
things earlier since they have multiple steps.
4. Decide on 2-3 days a week that you will schedule 20
minutes or so to write in your process journal. Mark
these days with symbol of some kind on the calendar. On
these days, write anything and everything you can think
of about your project: actions taken, thoughts /concerns
/feelings, ideas, conversations you have had, sketches etc.
Writing in your process journal will make your life MUCH
EASIER when it comes time to write the Personal Report.
5. Put your calendar in a visible spot – and add any
supervisor meetings that are made to your calendar.
Check, use, and revise your calendar as needed!

WHAT ARE MY RESPONSIBILITIES TO MY SUPERVISOR?
1. It is your responsibility to show up to the “Meet and Greet”
day with appropriate and necessary materials.
2. You will honor all appointments and get in touch with your
supervisor in advance if you are unable to attend a scheduled
meeting.
3. You are responsible for bringing your Process Journal and
Student Guide to every meeting.
You should also be prepared to have work evaluated and to take
notes on plans and ideas discussed.

4. You should ask your supervisor for advice and
feedback about your project goal and process for
completion, and take the supervisor’s comments
seriously.
5. You are responsible for documenting meetings in the
“Meeting Notes” section in your Student Guide and for
completing assigned tasks before the next scheduled
meeting.
6. You should always interact with your supervisor in a
positive and respectful manner.

What are my supervisor’s responsibilities to me?
1. Your supervisor should keep scheduled appointments
with you and contact you in advance when unable to
keep a scheduled appointment.
2. Your supervisor will contact your parent and/or your
Personal Project coordinator via e- mail or telephone if
you do not initiate or keep scheduled appointments.
3. Your supervisor should help you to establish and
maintain the focus of your Personal Project and
maintain that it is proceeding as planned.

4. Your supervisor should suggest a variety of
resources and relevant sources of information you
may use to develop the product. The importance of
research should be emphasized.
5. Your supervisor should encourage you to keep
written records of meetings in the “Meeting Notes”.
Your supervisor should provide feedback on your
progress, continuously review your Process Journal,
and document meetings in the Supervisor Handbook
to obtain an overall view of your progress.

7. Your supervisor should help keep you focused on the
organization and presentation on the final piece of work,
advising you to be thorough and methodical.
8. Supervisors are invited and encouraged to attend the
MYP Personal Project Fair in the Spring of 2018 when
Personal Projects are exhibited and which students also
attend.

WHAT SHOULD MY PROCESS JOURNAL BE?
What your actual Process Journal looks like is up to you,
depending on the type of project you are creating.
Students have been successful using a notebook,
sketchbook, and electronic files – but if you come up with
a way that best suits you, just speak with your supervisor!

WHEN DO I WRITE IN MY PROCESS JOURNAL?
Think of your Process Journal as a “diary” of your
experience in creating the product for your Personal
Project.
Thoughts (Thinking Maps) Sketches
• Ideas Calculations
• Plans Meeting Note
• Questions Reminders
• Decisions
• Feelings and Reflections

You should write in your Process Journal at least
once a week. A detailed Process Journal will be
extremely helpful in the writing of your Personal
Report at the end of the Personal Project.

1. BRAINSTOM
Start your planning by brainstorming all the jobs
or stages you need to complete to achieve your
goal.

2. ORDER
Now organize your brainstorm into a
chronological order of events or tasks that need
to be completed.

3. DUE DATES
For each step, allocate a time frame or due date for
that stage to be completed by.
Note: Some of your steps and stages may overlap.

4. HOW?
For each step record how you may achieve this
stage. You can record helpful people, strategies,
where you will complete the step, tools you will
use, etc.

5. MANAGE YOUR
PROGRESS
• Annotate your progress in your process
journal and update the steps needed to be
added or time frames altered.
• Your Process Journal will record what you have
done, what you plan to do next, problems you
have encountered, solutions you have
developed and the progress you are making.

HOW TO ACHIEVE THE HIGHEST LEVELS IN
CRITERION A:
• The goal must be very clearly stated. This is
best done in its own paragraph, not hidden in
the middle of one. You can talk about the
evolution of your goal but make sure that the
person reading your report is not hunting
around trying to find the actual goal.

• “Define” means to give the precise meaning
of something so make sure the goal contains
clarifying statements if anything is unclear.
• Explain why this project is ‘highly challenging’
for you.

• Explain why you chose this project. Where
does your personal interest come from? Why
is it important to you?
• Talk about the global context in this part of
your report. How does it guide your research
and investigation in a meaningful way?
• Why did you choose to focus your report this
way?

• You need to be very detailed and specific
about what you already know about every
aspect of your proposed goal. Give examples
to help. It needs to be clear that your idea
stems from personal interest, but also that
there is some room for growth in terms of
your understanding of the topic.

In order to demonstrate research skills you need
to:
• - have a complete bibliography that shows
you have used a wide variety of sources
• - have in-text references where appropriate
• - write a detailed evaluation of some of the
sources you used (for example in OPVL
format)

PROMT Student-designed criteria Test or method of evaluation
Form:
What will your project look
like?
What materials will you use?
What size will your project be?
What tools will you use?
How will you assemble your
project?
Function:
What is it the purpose of your
project?
User/Audience:
Who is your project for?
What do you want your project
to do?
Where/why will your project
be used?
Costs:
How much will your project
cost to make?
How much will you sell it for?
How much profit could be
made on your item/project?

CRITERION B:
• The criteria will be used to self-assess the extent
to which you achieved your goal later in the
project. They should therefore reflect all the
elements of the goal. It is best to take some
advice from a real-life expert to decide what an
‘excellent’ outcome or product should be.
• The criteria can be written in list form, or better
still as a rubric.

• If the project has more than 1 aspect to the goal (for
example to learn something and then to perform),
there may be separate criteria for the parts.
• The plan should have been devised at the start of the
process and should include information about any
changes that were necessary along the way, with
reasoning. This can then also be used as evidence of
your self-management skills in a few sentences in the
body of your report, or included as an extract in the
appendices.

• You can achieve a high level for your self-
management skills by reflecting honestly on
your ability to manage yourself – not just by
meeting all the deadlines. It does not matter if
your plan changes – the important thing is to
reflect concisely on why it changed and how
you used your self-management skills to
adjust your planning.

CRITERION C:
• You must put evidence of your product or
outcome in your report (or appendices).

• You do not need to write a detailed
assessment of its quality against your
assessment criteria yet – that is in the next
section. But you might want to make a
statement about your overall feeling in
relation to its quality.
• Are you please with how it turned out?
• What might you do differently if you did it
again?

• Evaluate your thinking skills directly – write a
few paragraphs giving examples of when you
demonstrated excellent thinking skills. Put
additional evidence in the appendices if
necessary (but refer to it in the body of the
report).

• Evaluate your communication and social skills
directly - write a few paragraphs giving
• examples of when you demonstrated excellent
communication and social skills. Put
• additional evidence in the appendices if
necessary (but refer to it in the body of the
report).

How to achieve the highest levels in
criterion D:
• Use your own assessment criteria (rubric) and
be honest about the extent to which you
achieved each of the strands. Give a detailed
explanation of each and reflect honestly on
your product. This criterion measures your
ability to EVALUATE in an unbiased manner—
not justify the grade you would like to score.

• Include evidence from others about the quality of
your product/outcome if you can. Did you do a
survey or a test to find out what people thought?
• Reflect back on your previous knowledge and
describe and explain how your knowledge and
understanding of the topic you researched has
deepened.
• What did you think then and what do you think
now. Why has it changed?

• Reflect on the global context. To what extent
do you have a deeper appreciation of it now?
• How did it shape your project?
• Reflect on your personal development. What
have you learnt about yourself?

• It is VITAL that you give specific examples and
evidence where possible to back up or
demonstrate points that you are making.
• Make this section detailed, thoughtful,
reflective and specific –without getting
flowery.
• Use the appendices to show specific evidence.
• Refer to the appendices in the body of the
report.

THE REPORT
As you approach completion of your Personal Project
and using your Process Journal as a guide, you will
complete a Report.
The Report is an organized piece of writing that
describes the goals of your project, outlines the steps
you took to complete it, and explains its connection to
your chosen Area of Interaction. It also includes your
analysis of how effectively you pursued and completed
your goals.

THE REPORT MUST INCLUDE:
• Title Page
• Personal Project Title
• School Name
• Your Name
• Word Count (Minimum=1,500 and Maximum=
3,500)
• You may also include an image to make it unique
• Year
• Table of Contents

BODY OF THE REPORT
The report must include the following headings in the
order in which they appear below. The questions below
are guiding questions only. We expect and encourage
you to provide more details and additional information
as necessary.

EVALUATING RESOURCES
Authority: Accuracy: Currency: Bias:
Who is responsible
for presenting the
information?
‣ Who has written
the
information and can
we check their
qualifications?
Is the information
precise, can it be
proven and
Verified?
‣ Is the information
correct?
How old is this
information and is
this important?
‣ When was the
information
written?
Is the information
based on facts,
things we can
observe or based
more on opinions,
emotions? Is it
from just one
point-of-view?
‣ Who has written
the
information and can
we check their
qualifications?
Is the information
from an ‘expert’ in
this field?
Can we check the
accuracy of
information through
links, footnotes or
bibliography?
Has the information
been revised or
updated and if so,
when?
Is the information
from an ‘expert’ in
this field?

SUMMARY COMMENT: Based on this evaluation, this source is a credible
and authentic source for me to use in my research.

SUMMARY COMMENT: Based on this evaluation, this source is factual, but
further reading will be required to verify information and to obtain a
balanced view of the president.

WORKS CITED
• “A Step-by-Step Guide to the MYP Personal Project.” Misslauraengland, 27 May 2015,
misslauraengland.blog/2015/04/10/a-guide-to-completing-your-ib-myp-personal-
project/.
• “MYP Areas of Interaction (AoI).” MYPOSC,
myposc.wikispaces.com/MYP+Areas+of+Interaction+(AoI).
• White, Eleanor. “Starting a Career within Marketing Automation.” Resource on Demand,
9 Nov. 2015, resourceondemand.com/starting-a-career-within-marketing-automation/.
• “EIA Is A Tool To Gauge The Socio-Economic and Environmental Effects Of Different
Projects.” HK Butterfly!, hkbutterfly.org/post/eia-is-a-tool-to-gauge-the-socio-economic-
and-environmental-effects-of-different-projects/. Accessed 28 Sept. 2017.
• “Figure 2f from: Irimia R, Gottschling M (2016) Taxonomic revision of Rochefortia Sw.
(Ehretiaceae, Boraginales). Biodiversity Data Journal 4: e7720.
https://Doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.4.e7720.” doi:10.3897/bdj.4.e7720.figure2f.
• Programs, www.absolutelyrefined.com/Programs.html.
• “Important Forms for Kidz Korner.” St Pauls United Methodist Church Important Forms
for Kidz Korner Comments, www.stpaulsumc.com/important-forms-for-kidz-korner/.
• Bluleadz. “How to Use the New Keyword Planner in Google Adwords.” Tampa Inbound
Marketing Agency, www.bluleadz.com/blog/bid/96694/How-to-Use-the-New-Keyword-
Planner-in-Google-Adwords.
• “Health Education Clipart Clipart.” WorldArtsMe Cliparts Collections.,
worldartsme.com/health-education-clipart.html#gal_post_4771_health-education-
clipart-1.jpg.

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