What is Genius Hour?
Genius Hour is a way of learning in which students are guided by their own interests, curiosity to learn and their own background knowledge. It is loved by all students as it allows them to play with their ideas and their learning.
It is an open ended learning method where students are driven by their passion, curiosity and their own self-direction. It may look less organized and less formal than the traditional means of studying.
It is completely opposite to the traditional rigid method of education. It allows students to explore their interests, their passions and their ideas. In this the main thing is that the students are given their own space to learn and explore.
The main idea here is to empower students and let them do what they want, learn what they want to learn and let their curiosity drive their research. Its unique features separate it from the traditional method of education.
This is also applicable in organizations, where the employees are able to spend a particular amount of time on their own passion projects. They generally spend around 20% of their time working on their own projects, their own passion. The main idea behind it is that this will make the employees motivated, happy, creative and will benefit the company also.
The main characteristics of Genius Hour is :
- Student Centric
- New and Continuous Challenges
- Purpose Friendly
- Social
- Messy
- Orignal
- Personalized
One of the main things here is that in Genius Hour is the lack of specific rules. Its mainly about students and their passion and curiosity.
There are 3 underlying basic rules for Genius Hour :
- It is mainly driven by student curiosity
- It is all about research or new learning
- The end product can be shared or published
These rules can be changed, like it can be different from one school to another, but the underlying concept remains the same.
