Inquiry in a Modern Classroom

I'm Robert Barnett, and I co-founded the Modern Classrooms Project to help teachers deliver inquiry-based learning.

I developed the Modern Classrooms instructional model in large part to facilitate inquiry-based learning experiences in my own high school math classroom in Washington, DC.  On this page, I'll walk you through my approach to inquiry-based instruction, and give you a few tools you can use to get your own students learning through inquiry.  

If at any time you'd like to learn more about the Modern Classrooms model, I encourage you to enroll in our free online course.

PRELUDE: INQUIRY IN ACTION

Before you listen to me, you should see me in action.  If this style of teaching is appealing to you, you can read on to understand how I tried to infuse inquiry into my classes!  Below is a statistics class I taught in November of 2015.

***Note: While my class is a high-school math class, the practices I use here can be applied in any grade level or subject area!  If you don't believe me, ask around in MCP's Facebook Group.***

I'll explain each part of my lesson below.

PART I: THE DO NOW

I started each class with a whole-class warm-up.  This was a nice way to build community in class, and make any necessary announcements.  In general, my Do Now’s had two relatively simple review questions - this is good practice for every student in the class, as well as a good opportunity for me to spot lingering gaps - and one more conceptual question.   

My Do Now's usually trailed a few days behind the "on-pace lesson" for the day, so that: 

• Every student could participate and feel successful.

• We could continue to review prior/prerequisite skills.

The Do Now for my lesson is below.

PART 2: INQUIRY TASK

At the start of each lesson, I posed to my students what I hoped would be an interesting and unfamiliar problem.  The goal of this "hook" problem was to engage students and get them thinking about new concepts, even if they didn't know how or where to get started.  This is the beauty and fun of learning -- solving new problems without knowing exactly how!

Students would do their best on these tasks – correct answers were not expected, and in many cases didn’t actually exist – and then present their solutions to me, either individually or in small groups.  They were graded on a presentation rubric aligned to my school's Common Core math priorities.

Because many of my students missed class frequently, I also created an alternative pathway for students who were unable to present in class: they could explain their answers in writing through Canvas.  This helped students develop their writing skills, which I believe are extremely important in any subject.  

Note that, after a unit started, different students were starting different lessons at different times, so this was all happening asynchronously.  The video above is an outlier because it happened to be the first day of a new unit.

My inquiry task for the lesson in the video is below.

I assessed my students' work on these with the presentation rubric below, which was aligned to Common Core Math Practices that my school had identified as focus areas.  The goal here was not to assess students' accuracy, but rather their efforts and mindsets.

As you can see in the video, I completed this rubric in real time during class, gave each team feedback and a score, and then asked them to reflect using the boxes at the bottom.  They turned the completed rubric back in to me at the end of class.

PART 3: INSTRUCTIONAL VIDEO

Once students are hooked by an interesting problem, they’re more interested in the solution.  In the video following each inquiry task, I walked through my own analysis of the problem, and used it to introduce a new mathematical concept.  I wasn't just explaining random math concepts -- I was giving students the just-in-time tools they needed to solve the problem they'd just encountered.  Here's my video for the lesson above: 

At my school, many teachers used Cornell notes.  For each of my videos, I created a Cornell notes template for students to use if they chose.  Over time, I encouraged students to stop using my template and start taking their own notes.  Here's the template I created for this lesson:

PART 4: PRACTICE

After explaining the concept through an instructional video, I’d ask students to practice applying it.  I often used online resources like Khan Academy and IXL, or problems from old math textbooks.  I only created my own practice problems when it felt necessary.

Students could choose to practice in groups or independently.  I spent my time circulating the room, reviewing student work, and pushing students on their reasoning.  

In the case of this introductory (and relatively conceptual) lesson, I had my students complete some very simple review questions on range, and then work on an applied problem about weather:

PART 5: DEMONSTRATION OF MASTERY

Once students were ready, they’d take an online quiz in Canvas (my LMS).  These quizzes had a mix of conceptual questions (multiple choice/select all that apply) and calculated-formula questions, which gave each student the same problem, but with different numbers.  Using requirements in Canvas, I made it so that students needed to score 8/10 to unlock the next lesson – at which point the lesson cycle would repeat again!  Students could take each mastery check as many times as they needed, either to reach 8/10 or exceed it.

Having Mastery Checks online ensured that students who missed class could catch up.  To be honest, it allowed for some cheating as well.  I always felt, however, that the best way to address cheating was with a stern conversation: if a student failed a unit-end assessment after receiving high scores on their mastery check, it was a good opportunity for me to explain to that student WHY cheating is actually harmful to them.  I’d much rather students learn this lesson in high school than be thrown out of college for cheating later on.

POSTSCRIPT: BRINGING INQUIRY TO LIFE

I loved teaching in this way.  It was a lot of work on the front end, but for my students it created a healthy mix of collaborative inquiry, direct instruction (through video), and individual practice/assessment -- and for me it meant I could spend all my time working closely with them.  This model also met the needs of students who missed class, and gave students the opportunity to build their writing and speaking skills.

Can you implement a similar model in your own classroom?  Of course... in fact you can improve on it!  Where there is a will, there is a way -- and change starts every day.  The Modern Classrooms Project's free online course is a great place to start.

With my gratitude for all that you do,

Robert Barnett

President & Co-Founder, the Modern Classrooms Project

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