Inquiry Learning From a Primary Perspective

Anna Stephenson Shift Learning Facilitator, Massey University

•  This presentation is based on my experiences of working as a professional learning facilitator in primary schools.

•  I work alongside teachers in a number of schools who are inquiring into their practice to raise achievement.

•  A focus for a number of my teachers is inquiry learning, to motivate learners by involving them in the construction of knowledge through active involvement.

•  Some schools have existing ‘well oiled’ inquiry models that teachers and students have working knowledge of.

•  Other schools have a model that was once used but has not been reviewed or revised in recent times.

•  Generally, the professional learning provided is around; -‘inquiry as a pedagogy’

- school owned models - authentic contexts - documenting the learning

The essence of inquiry learning

 Inquiry  implies  involvement  that  leads  to  understanding.  Furthermore,  involvement  in  learning  implies  possessing  skills  and  a9tudes  that  permit  you  to  seek  resolu:ons  to  ques:ons  and  issues  while  you  construct  new  knowledge.  

 

What does this

have to do with

inquiry learning?

•  Contemporary inquiry practices go beyond the “unit of work” and weave their way across the curriculum.

•  The inquiry teacher uses inquiry approaches throughout the day to assist students to grow their competencies as thinkers, as self managers, as researchers, as communicators and as collaborators.

•  Inquiry learning involves building relationships, ”knowing where students come from and building on what students bring with them” (Ka Hikitia, 2010) is central to a trusting and healthy learning environment.

The Key Messages

•  There is a clear alignment to the characteristics of assessment for learning through co-construction, learning intentions, success criteria, goal setting and reflections.

•  The concepts of a differentiated and personalised approach are captured by involving students in decision making, having different options and outcomes for learning and allowing students to ask questions and follow their own curiosities.

•  The richness of student voice clearly positions the

learner in the middle with their learning built around them as opposed to learning being done to them.

•  Some would say, that an inquiry model takes the focus

away from these attributes of effective pedagogy. It puts the focus on packaging learning up into a formula to be followed.

•  If you were to ask teacher’s what is inquiry learning, what answers would you get? Would you get, “An approach to learning that is rich in student voice, relationships and student understanding of how we are learning what we are learning” or would the responses more likely be, “When students ask questions and find out the answers to their curiosities… oh and there is an action, or a social action at the end” (Nick Rate, 2012).

Models of Inquiry

Split screen teaching and learning

 Content  

 

The  learning  process  –  

students  ac:ve  in  their  own  learning  

R e l a t i o n s h i p s

Taken from the research by Guy Claxton

Split screen teaching and learning

The  stream  Li,er  

Recycling  The  science  of  cooking  

Exploring    and  

Inves:ga:ng  

R e l a t i o n s h i p s

For example………….. Inquiry Learning @ South School

The context: the vehicle for learning (The secondary focus, not assessed)

The learning: what they are getting better at!

Worthy question, issue, problem or

idea

For  example;  This  school  spends  $4500  per  year  in  the  disposal  of  rubbish  –  how  could  we  reduce  this  and    use  the  money  elsewhere?  

•  Key Competencies

•  Assessment for learning strategies and tools e.g. leaning intentions and success criteria, matrices

•  Thinking tools e.g De Bonos hats, Thinkers Keys, Thinking Maps

•  Self assessment and reflection models and tools e.g. SOLO Taxonomy, Anne Davies

•  Strategies, tools and understandings developed by: Kath Murdoch – Reflecting on Personal

Understandings Lane Clarke – Think Box and Think Tower Guy Claxton – Building Learning Power Karen Boyes – Habits of mind

Split screen teaching and learning

 Content  

 

The  learning  process  –  

students  ac:ve  in  their  own  learning  

“So what does this look like for the Teacher?”

R e l a t i o n s h i p s

“What does this look like for the teacher?”

•  Stop thinking about how to teach the content •  Stop thinking about curriculum coverage •  Start thinking about the interests of the students and what

they bring to the learning •  Provoke curiosity - planned opportunities to model and record

curiosities •  Refer to learning attitudes and skill development, not just

tasks and content. •  Focus on process and progress, not just product. •  Always remind yourself, “what are they getting better at?”

 

Content    

Split screen teaching and learning

 Content  

 

The  learning  process  –  

students  ac:ve  in  their  own  learning  

“So what does this look like for the Teacher?”

R e l a t i o n s h i p s

“What does this look like for the teacher?”

•  Ask yourself:

How best will learning take place? How can I actively involve every student? How will this help them develop as learners? Share this with the learners. What tools and strategies best suit?

•  Make sure you and your students know the purpose of every

task and of how it will advance their learning. •  Provide opportunities for students to plan how they will learn

and to reflect on the learning process.

The  learning  process  –  students  ac:ve  in  their  own  learning  

“What does this look like for the teacher?” •  Encourage them to ‘own the learning’ •  Teachers give students time to stop and think about why and

how they learned, not just what.

•  Provide opportunities to use explicit thinking routines which encourage students to think about their learning.

•  Talk about your own learning. Tell them what you learned and

how you learned it.

•  Talk about how your thinking has changed and how your skills have developed. Learning is continuous……

Split screen teaching and learning

 Content  

 

The  learning  process  –  

students  ac:ve  in  their  own  learning  

“So what does this look like for the Learner?”

R e l a t i o n s h i p s

“What does this look like for the learner?”

CONTENT

 THE  LEARNING  PROCESS  -­‐students  ac:ve  in  their  own  

learning  

                       

Instead of thinking of a school as a place where 300 young people attend to be provided with an education, try thinking about a school as a research site, populated with 300 small sized researchers.

Rethinking the role of schools as producers of useful and valuable knowledge opens up many important questions. Equally, it positions schools as an important new resource for the community and provides students with valuable experience in serious knowledge work.

AUTHENTIC CONTEXTS

Switching kids on through inquiry and authentic contexts

David W. Jardine www.galileo.org/inquiry-why.html

•  Inquiry emanates from a question, problem or exploration that has meaning to the students

•  The inquiry leads student s to acquire and use the key competencies expected in working organisations such as team work, problem solving, communications and project management.

•  The inquiry requires students to determine which technologies are most appropriate to the task.

•  The reason for proposing inquiry in our schools is that we want students to engage in authentic, real work that reflects the work that an adult at work or the community might tackle.

Switching kids on through inquiry and authentic contexts

David W. Jardine www.galileo.org/inquiry-why.html

•  It is vital to inquiry to choose a topic of inquiry that is rich and generous enough to embrace all of those who venture into it. Learning for the students and the teacher.

•  Here is a simple analogy; When I go out into the garden with my young son, I don’t send him off to a developmentally appropriate garden. I take him to the same garden where I am going to work. Now, once we get there and get to the work that place needs, of course, each of us will work as each of us is able. We are not identical in ability, experience, strength, patience, and so on. But both of us will be working in the same place doing some part of the real work that the garden requires. This garden and the real work it requires, is itself rich and generous and multiple and varied enough to embrace our differences.

This place, this topography, this topic, has room for us both. It is a place where we can gather together in our differences and work/learn in ways that each of us has something to offer to this place that is irreplaceable.

The essence of inquiry learning

 Inquiry  implies  involvement  that  leads  to  understanding.  Furthermore,  involvement  in  learning  implies  possessing  skills  and  a9tudes  that  permit  you  to  seek  resolu:ons  to  ques:ons  and  issues  while  you  construct  new  knowledge.  

 

What does this

have to do with

inquiry learning?