Finding Traction with Professional Development II: Inquiry-Based Learning

Inquiry-Based Learning and its near cousins of Project-Based and Problem-Based Learning have been well researched and implemented in schools around the world for the better part of a decade.

My most memorable experience with the concept of Inquiry-Based Learning as something separate from the "research process" started about eight years ago when I began coursework for a Master's in Education. I recall a teacher at the Annie Fisher STEM Magnet school saying "everything starts with a question." The mission of the Annie Fisher STEM Magnet School in Hartford is to empower students to be "effective innovators and communicators who can creatively solve problems and compete as responsible global citizens." All disciplines in the school are expected to help students develop the habits of learning that would support the school's mission and to work on cross-discipline teams to plan and implement IBL and PBL. Recently, the Hartford Public Schools have developed a Boundless program that integrates the Public Libary services with school programs to take full advantage of the YouMedia lab, internet access and more. The first HPL Branch in a school opened at the Sarah J Rawson Elementary school this fall. Hartford Public Schools developed these STEM, magnet, and community school models to address the racially, educationally and economically diverse populations they serve.

Why Now?

The why question at Wheeler may well be, why now? Though not the "driving force" behind this deep dive into Inquiry, ubiquitous 1:1 technology certainly opened the door to this model over five years ago in terms of integrating the use of technology into the student learning process and placing information once deliverable only by the teacher, into their hands. Even more, reaching back to the vision of our founder Mary C Wheeler, we've established a course for the future "to learn our powers and be answerable for their use." This mission, if I am interpreting this correctly, means that student-centered learning needs to be at the core of all the teaching and learning in the classroom as we help students recognize their power and take responsibility for it as citizens of the school, community, and the world. How will we effectively serve the mission? Students will need all of the habits of learning mentioned earlier and a sense of wonder and engagement.  The school is dedicated to helping each student find their power and become a citizen of their community and the world, then The level of student engagement is an integral factor in this model of learning. According to the research, it is an imperative criterion for success. .” It is literally neurobiologically impossible to think deeply about things that you don’t care about “ (Lahey).

The most immediate and concrete answer to "why now" is CitySide.

For those who don't know, this is a PBL(IBL) learning initiative for 8th-grade history which will begin in the fall of 2019. The driving question behind such an initiative is how do we develop creative and intellectually curious citizens of the world and personalize this learning through connections with the broader community? This initiative is broad in scope and will call on all of the skills mentioned earlier that we value as educators as well as many that will be challenging for students such as planning, self-management, self-reflection, collecting evidence of learning, perseverance, synthesizing information and data and sharing with audiences beyond the classroom or school. 

What is one driving question you have about Inquiry-Based Learning? Write it on this Padlet 

What does the research show?

I guess my point is, the benefits of inquiry-based learning have been well researched, implemented and part of the educational landscape for a decade or more in the United States and in many other countries. It has been around so long that IBL has been parsed in several ways to include levels of inquiry, the question formulation technique, online inquiry, personal digital inquiry models and more. The research is replete with how IBL teaches habits of learning that most educators agree we value including, critical thinking, creativity, asking good open-ended questions (QFT), problem-solving, working with others, self-reliance, self-management, and perseverance. The research also shows that content knowledge is not enough to foster these habits of learning.

Ethical, engaged, and creative citizens of our school, community, and world

These are dispositions of learning that are not easily acquired without the chance to practice them before the students encounter an intellectually challenging program like Cityside.  These habits of thinking and learning through authentic student questions, open-ended conclusions, critical thinking, comprehension, and synthesis must be routinely incorporated into meaningful inquiry and problem-solving opportunities. Moving beyond the "why now" question we come to the "how are we going to do this?" part of the journey.

What does IBL look like?  There are books and articles published over the last decade written about Inquiry-Based Learning and what it looks like. Trevor Mackenzie has written two easily accessible books with concrete ideas to move students toward an Inquiry Mindset and guide teachers through the sometimes confusing work of developing an inquiry practice that is not an add-on at the end of a unit of study but is the curriculum, the unit of study with all of its contingent assessment practices. The Buck Institute, leading proponents of project-based learning acknowledges that too much emphasis on the product or simply finishing out a semester with an add-on is not PBL and not valuable to student learning.PDI Model, Facilitating Inquiry-Based Learning (Alberta,2004)

Before we can effectively re-imagine our work with Inquiry, we should reflect on what we are doing presently that supports this model.  What are we doing in classrooms now to create space for curiosity and creativity? Some of these practices include:
Ask Questions QFT Open and Closed

Allowing 5-10 minutes every day to practice asking questions (very challenging for students)
As a group activity, have students generate questions together or build off of each other's questions
Understand the difference between open and closed questions
Find and evaluate information needs, sources
Compare prior knowledge to what they want to know and then what they learned
Use elbow partners to share what they learned
Discuss where to find sources, how to make sure they are helpful and accurate, give credit
Construct a new understanding, examine what they know, need to know, learn (KWL)
Opportunities to draw conclusions about questions and hypotheses
Sharing Learning with an audience
Provide students with an opportunity to seek feedback from an audience
Allow students to select a specific audience for an assignment
Communicating their learning
Express new ideas to share learning with others
Explore multiple ways to present information
Reflection
Ask students to think about what they are proud of in their work
Have students write about one thing they would do differently next time
Ask new questions

Discuss the practices in the Inquiry process listed above. Which elements of the inquiry model do you routinely incorporate and feel most confident about in your current teaching practice? Write it on a post-it and put add it to the chart paper grid. What would you like to add to your practice?

How do we move from mini-bursts of inquiry to Inquiry-Based Learning and the full arc of Inquiry?

Through a scaffolded approach to inquiry, Trevor Mackenzie demonstrates how to gradually increase student agency over learning while providing learners with the necessary skills to be successful in their inquiry.
For next time: take a moment to think about an inquiry practice that does not come at the end of a unit of study but is the unit of study. How might that look, how should it be scaffolded in the process? Should it be Structured, Guided or Free Inquiry? Who would you want to work with in terms of a Learning Team and interdisciplinary teachers on your team and other resources? Use Flipgrid to respond and record your responses.

Works Cited

Lahey, Jessica. "To Help Students Learn, Engage the Emotions." New York Times, 4 May 2016, well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/05/04/to-help-students-learn-engage-the-emotions/. Accessed 29 Jan. 2019.