All marketing gimmicks aside, when you look at this image it is plainly obvious to see the progress that has been made:
1. Next year I'm going to give my students a problem to engage in on DAY 1. Then, I'm going to show them this infomercial. We'll talk about how progress takes time and that even though you can't see it day-to-day, by the end of the year you will. Then, on one of the last days of the year, I'll give them the exact same problem. I imagine the comparison between their initial attempt and last attempt will be stunningly different.
2. This doesn't have to be a year long project. We could use the same idea to measure student progress through a unit. The beauty of problem-based learning is that you start with a rich task that perplexes the students. Here is the one for my next unit: