From the project-based learning method towards the competence based approach to education

The competence-based approach to education has been found to be effective for teaching. Introduced in Italian secondary schools in 2010 by the Ministry for Education, it has hardly had a real adoption. The paper illustrates a study whose goal is to find elective ways to support the adoption of the competence-based approach in the Italian secondary schools. Focusing on the Computer Science teachers, who often use the project-based learning method, the study investigates if this method helps to inductively embrace the competence-based approach. With the aim at understanding how Computer Science teaching is competence-based, we designed and realized an action-research course. The course started with an introduction to the project-based learning method, followed by the observation of teachers implementing this method. The preliminary results suggest that the project-based learning method can drive towards the competence based approach, provided the projects are carefully designed and subsequently managed.