Genius Hour

Also called 20% Time or Passion Projects, Genius Hour came about from an initiative at Google. At Google employees were allowed to spend 20% of their time working on a project of their choosing. 20% time led to the many innovations that Google still uses today such as Gmail.

In the classroom we will be using Genius Hour to work on our own passion projects. These projects are different to usual projects in that the class will get to spend more than a week or two working on them. This means that the children get to focus in on a topic in much more detail than they normally would.

• Critical Thinking

• Creativity

• Collaboration

• Researching

• Planning

• Communication

• Learn to use new tools

• Time Management

• Presentation Skills

Obviously there are some rules to make sure that Genius Hour runs smoothly.

• The students need to have a rough plan of what they hope to achieve.

• They should have enough work to do to fill the time on a Friday afternoon.

• They need to source the materials that they will need.

• During Genius Hour the class can look at what others are doing but they must be sure that their own project is getting done and that they are not bothering anyone else.

• If a project is running under or over time the students need to figure out why this is and if their is anything they can do to either make up time or make use of the extra time.