Individual Contributions in Project-Based Learning: A Qualitative Study of Moroccan EFL Students

Abstract

Project-based learning (PBL) has increasingly been used to promote active participation, collaboration, learner autonomy, and meaningful language use in English as a foreign language (EFL) classrooms. However, collaborative project work may make individual participation difficult to observe, particularly when students work collectively toward a shared final product. This study explores how Moroccan EFL students describe their individual contributions and difficulties during collaborative project work. The study adopts a qualitative descriptive case-study design and draws on individual progress records completed by approximately 26 secondary-school students during classroom project work. The analysis indicates that students’ reported contributions extended beyond the production of the final project and included research and information gathering, writing and content preparation, drawing and visual design, decision-making, planning, presentation preparation, and other practical tasks. Students also reported different forms of difficulty, particularly uncertainty about how to complete particular tasks and challenges associated with design and project preparation, while some students reported experiencing no significant difficulty. The findings suggest that individual progress records can help make otherwise less visible forms of self-reported participation more observable within collaborative PBL. Rather than evaluating the effectiveness of PBL, the study provides a classroom-based account of what students reported doing during project work and the challenges they reported encountering. The study contributes to the limited body of research documenting reported student participation in Moroccan secondary-school EFL project work.