Critical Challenge Question: How can I teach students how to ask essential questions and use inquiry to build the skills and abilities needed for critical thinking and problem solving? An Inquiring into Effective Inquiry How did I come up with this idea? This past January our class attempted a polar bear inquiry unit. Getting students to think beyond the most simple “why” questions into deeper thinking such as making connections, analyzing and synthesizing information was challenging. Below is an example of what we did. What became most apparent was that the students did not know how to ask essential quality questions. They did not understand how to use observation to guide their questions and seemed unmotivated to work together to find a solution to our class problem.
Where am I right now? A few weeks ago, some my students came rushing into the classroom and over to the pots of sprouting seeds we had planted . At that time, we were supposed to be quietly reading so I ushered the students over to get books. Something felt wrong with that action. Later that day when we did looked at our seeds, I once again attempted to get the students to make observations and ask questions based on those observations. It was like pulling teeth - even with modelling. Reflecting on the day, what I really felt was that I had a missed out on a teachable moment of curiosity and wonderment. If I had rescheduled the lesson right at the moment of excitement, I considered that it might have led to more active questioning and inquiry. It was then I began to think seriously about researching into how to develop my students' skills and abilities to explore and find answers. The following will be used as a guide for my critical challenge question. How do I most effectively teach the children about essential questioning? How do I best model inquiry skills? Is there is a better way to practice and ask questions to get students thinking? What types of activities best promote wonderment and curiosity? The process and final goal? To begin, I did an initial search to see if I could find enough open education resources to support the research and learning and was happy to find a variety of materials to complete the project. With the development of BC’s new curriculum, we as teachers are expected to look at our units in the light of inquiry. I am looking forward to developing a comprehensive list of resources to pull from for each subject area. My task for this next week will be to look through the research and come up with ideas on how to best implement my plan. My goal in the end is to come up with a primary cross-curricular inquiry unit that will help develop the foundational skills necessary to support using inquiry, critical thinking and problem solving required for student success in the future grades and beyond.
Brad
5/20/2016 10:44:42 am
I have also wondered how many teachable moments I have missed when I was focused on schedule and order. It is great to reflect and see how we can adapt our style to hopefully better fit the students. I am sure this will be a great journey for you. Comments are closed.
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AuthorK-7 Coordinator in SD68. Archives
January 2017
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