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Inquiring into inquiry has been of great interest to me for many years. As this school year draws to a close, I am constantly astounded and inspired by the genuine inquiry I see, hear and feel in my class.
Look at these photographs from my G2 class today and yesterday. Which ones would you consider to be evidence of what inquiry might look like?
Considering inquiry as a process and a stance helps us to understand that “it” involves doing and being and feeling. Linguistically, it leans more towards verbs than nouns. Instead of looking for things (whether these are resources, products of learning, manipulatives, templates or activities), looking for acts of thinking, curiosity and engagement is more likely to showcase inquiry in action. For me, the photos alone are not enough to evidence inquiry as they simply capture something at one moment in time, and in fact, raise questions about the context, purpose and the bigger learning story. Now imagine the photographs changing to videos, with movement and sound that reveal the processes at play.
Click here if you would like to read the “stories” of each photograph above.
Click here if you would like to read the “stories” of each photograph above.
Each paragraph corresponds to a different picture in the order they are displayed.
Students often inquire into words, sounds and parts of words. They notice patterns, develop theories, test them out and relish in finding what they have named "rule breakers". This week we are exploring plurals and this morning, one student said, "Ski and skis" but wrote sky and skies. There was talk about the difference in the sounds and meaning. When I wrote skis correctly, students noticed there were skis that you use and skis to name an action. One girl asked, "How do you tell the difference?" A wonderful conversation followed and beautiful connections made to context.
Students are in interest groups researching a famous historical figure or event. We are using MISO (media, interview, survey and observation) by C B Kaye as a way to help students think about how they will find out. One group are curious about the first person to land on the moon. Browsing the website for Children's BBC, students noticed different names were on view leading to the importance of checking and cross-referencing with multiple sources.
Students are inquiring into transforming shapes through reflection, rotation and translation. Each student designed one shape that was used as a template, and through exploration, they used this one shape to develop a design. Students were in awe about how one shape could generate such original and creative patterns and designs.
One student had explored Google Earth at home and wanted to share this app with his friends. He confidently gave some of his friends an overview, and he then started to find distances between two places in different units of measurement. One student was moving back to the UK and then was fascinated by the distances between his new home and some places and sights in France, including the Eiffel Tower.
I read aloud the story of Moi & Marie Antoinette as part of a genre focus on historical fiction. The book aroused a lot of curiosity about monarchs and power. Questions included were: Why did she agree to move to France? Why did she marry someone she didn't know? Why was she killed? Why does France not have a Royal Family now? Why do some countries have a president instead of a king or a queen?
I often try to introduce new resources to the learning environments to see how students respond. Many students love animals in the class and are fascinated by some of their adaptations and capabilities. Miniature animals appeared in the room and one girl was inspired to construct a world for animals in her play.
The morning message often tries to help students make personal connections to abstract ideas. Yesterday, VE Day was discussed at length. As we spoke about remembering the past, one student made a connection to his great-grandfather who avoids eating certain foods as their taste remind him of the terror of World War II. This haunting anecdote offered such a powerful perspective on learning about the past.
Earlier in the year, some students (those wanting to share their learning with a slide deck) were shown how to use Google Slides to develop a presentation. There is now a larger group of students collaborating on a set of slides about animals they consider to be amazing. It is a joy to watch them as they play with different tools within Slides and collaborate to share their knowledge of different animals. In their excitement and discovery of so many different animals, the group has decided to classify animals into groups, starting with vertebrates.
A photograph of a “thing” may well suggest there is no inquiry, but knowing the full story might reveal the process of inquiry is alive and well. A photograph of learners “doing” something may suggest inquiry, but, in fact, not all hands-on learning is inquiry. A photograph of students learning about a unit of inquiry, with a conceptual central idea in view, might suggest inquiry, but the learning about the unit may well be an accumulation of facts (without purpose) or a set of tasks to complete for the teacher. A photograph of lunchtime might not suggest inquiry, but some of the most important inquiries learners pursue happen when they have time and space to do just that. A photograph of a teacher giving direct explanations might not suggest inquiry, but it may well have been what was needed at the time in response to something so an inquiry could move forward. A photograph of a template students are completing might not be considered inquiry, yet this could be a scaffold co-constructed with the students to take notes on areas of interest to different groups.
The process of inquiry is layered with nuance. Inquiry does not look one way. When there is a culture of inquiry, anything and anyone might pique interest, elicit connections, provoke questions, trigger reactions, develop theories, challenge thinking, explore new perspectives, seek surprise, unearth wonderings, stir the mind, entertain doubt or cause confusion... anytime and anywhere! The beauty of inquiry!
When reflecting on our practice, we might ask, “Is it inquiry?” or “What does it look like in different subject areas?”. Promoting a culture of inquiry (as described above) transcends disciplines. There may be particular routines, engagements and resources that increase the chances of students inquiring into big ideas, but these “things” themselves aren’t the inquiry. In fact, we might craft provocations with wonderful intent and direct alignment with the big ideas being explored, and search tirelessly for inspiring resources, but in a community of inquirers, the one thing to expect is the unexpected!
A shift in considering ‘it’ (inquiry) to be more about verbs (processes) than nouns is perhaps a step in the right direction.
Reflection
Reflection
What evidence of inquiry as a process do you see in your classrooms?
How have you and your students developed this climate of inquiry?
Where to next? (Thank you @whatedsaid)
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