What's New - January 2006

Inquiry-Based Learning "Best Practices"

January's theme is Inquiry-based Learning "Best Practices." Below you will find links to workshops, databases of inquiry-based learning activities, case studies, readings, tools, and professional development activities all of which are designed to help you as you begin or continue to facilitate inquiry-based learning in your classroom.

Annenberg Media Learner.Org - Learning Science Through Inquiry
© 1997-2005 Annenberg Media
http://www.learner.org/channel/workshops/inquiry/synopses.html

This eight-part workshop series for kindergarten to grade 8 science teachers shows inquiry teaching and learning in action, with real teachers and students in real classrooms. Whether you have already experimented with inquiry teaching and want to enhance your practice, or are new to the approach and want to know how to make it work in your classroom, Learning Science Through Inquiry has been developed to help you understand the process and how it benefits students.

Each of the eight workshops includes print resources as well as one-hour video-on-demand programs that feature classroom case studies and informative discussions. A simple registration process is required before you can view the videos (as streaming media) but the workshop/course registration is free.

The Annenberg Channel is produced by Annenberg Media with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

Concept to Classroom
© 2004 Educational Broadcasting Corporation
http://www.thirteen.org/edonline/concept2class/inquiry/index.html

This Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) sponsored site features a free, self-paced online workshop on inquiry-based learning. The workshop has four parts: explanation, demonstration, exploration and implementation. The explanation section discusses the concept of inquiry-based learning, its history, perspectives, benefits, and relationships to other teaching techniques. The demonstration section presents "inquiry in action" in classrooms and schools, offering links to lesson plans, albeit based on American teaching standards (e.g., National Council of Teachers of Mathematics). The exploration section identifies starting points, some challenges you might experience, some ways you might want to integrate technology, some suggestions for assessment as well as ideas for involving parents and your community. Finally, the implementation section offers four principles and thirteen steps to guide you as you facilitate inquiry-based learning in your classroom. Each section offers this information in a variety of ways including check lists, links to additional resources, diagrams, illustrations, and video clips, and also includes a hyperlinked glossary. Several open-ended questions are posed throughout the workshop.

The Exploratorium Institute for Inquiry
http://www.exploratorium.edu/ifi/

Created in response to widespread interest in inquiry-based science instruction, the Exploratorium Institute for Inquiry provides workshops, programs, on-line support, and an intellectual community of practice which afford science reform educators a deep and rich experience of how inquiry learning looks and feels. Of particular interest are the:

• Professional development activities designed to build an understanding of inquiry and the elements of inquiry teaching
• Database of inquiry materials, including articles, speeches, presentations, and links.

Support for this web site is provided by the National Science Foundation, the Noyce Foundation, the Marin Community Foundation, Washington Mutual, and The Wells Fargo Foundation.

Also featured on this site is a back issue of Connect which offers six case studies of classroom inquiry. See below for a description of and link to this issue.

Connect (March/April 2000, Volume 13, Issue 4) © 2000 The Exploratorium http://www.exploratorium.edu/ifi/resources/classroom/connect/connect.pdf This issue features six articles, all by teachers in the Bay Area of San Francisco, working at different grade levels and with a variety of school populations. All the articles deal with helping students to engage in inquiry learning within their classroom settings. The teachers are skilled and have worked together extensively in the Exploratorium's professional development project, the Institute for Inquiry. In their classrooms, they face a variety of challenges and their approaches vary, based on the age group, student needs and other factors. We believe that these teachers' own work with inquiry learning leads them to tell valuable and intriguing stories about students becoming questioners, investigators and communicators. Many of these students look closely at the world around them and raise significant questions that can extend their learning remarkably.

Focus on Inquiry - A Teacher's Guide to Implementing Inquiry-Based Learning
© 2004 Alberta Learning, Alberta, Canada
http://www.education.gov.ab.ca/k_12/curriculum/bySubject/focusoninquiry.pdf

Inquiry-based learning is a way to achieve the goals of the Alberta programs of study. Focus on Inquiry, developed to provide support for implementing inquiry-based learning activities in Alberta classrooms, is intended for teachers working on their own or in teams, with or without the support of a teacher-librarian or other library personnel. It provides a six step instructional model (planning, retrieving, processing, creating, sharing and evaluating) that can be used by all teachers, Kindergarten to Grade 12, as they guide inquiry with their students. Inquiry-based learning activities can be used in various ways to accomplish the learning outcomes of Alberta programs of study: within core programs, within optional programs, across two or more curricula, and within the Information and Communication Technology curriculum.

Galileo Educational Network
© 2002-2005 Galileo Educational Network Association
http://www.galileo.org/index.html

Galileo Educational Network is an independent educational organization dedicated to improving student performance through the provision of engaging inquiry-based learning opportunities for students. This mission is achieved by providing job-embedded professional learning for teachers, and by conducting and publishing research.

The association's work is guided by seven principles including: stewarding the intellect through inquiry-based learning, infusing digital technologies, providing high quality assessment, honoring collaboration and teamwork, providing ongoing professional learning, fostering scholarship of teaching, and providing practical and thought-provoking preparation for pre-service teachers.

Galileo's comprehensive web site offers many resources of interest to teachers and administrators in Alberta including: descriptions of current research projects; case studies; high school inquiry-based ICT initiatives that are profiled through a series of brief video clips as well as links to student projects, inquiry-based math initiatives, several examples of classroom inquiry-based projects, and an extensive reading room with links to full text articles about inquiry-based learning.

Inquiry Page^TM
© 1998-2004, Inquiry Page Version 1.35
http://www.inquiry.uiuc.edu/index.php

The Inquiry Page is a free website that offers the following resources to facilitate inquiry-based learning:

• information about inquiry (definition, process, environment, articles and slide shows)
• links to mailing lists that foster participation in discussions and sharing resources about inquiry-based learning
• an Inquiry Unit Generator that allows users to produce online lesson plans, project outlines, and workshop plans
• resources related to assessment in an inquiry classroom
• a searchable database of Inquiry Units (note that units are largely based on American curriculum standards).

The web site has been created to provide tools, develop research opportunities, and build social and professional networks for discussing, understanding and fostering inquiry-based learning. A large, diverse and dynamic community consisting of programmers, educators, museum coordinators, librarians, and generally interested people meet weekly at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign to talk about the website design and inquiry-based learning. Others including biologists, language arts specialists, grassroot organizers, mathematicians, writers, and neighborhood leaders use the website's resources to pursue queries that interest them and occasionally contribute further resources.

Teaching Middle School Students to Be Active Researchers
Harriet Copel, Judith Zorfass (ASCD book, 1999) 8" x 10", 120 pages

This book offers middle school educators practical information about inquiry-based, interdisciplinary learning. The authors explore

• the underlying cognitive, social, and moral reasons why it is developmentally appropriate for adolescents to become active researchers
• how the I-Search (an inquiry-based, interdisciplinary unit) translates theory into practice in a manageable way so that it fits into the real lives of middle school teachers
• what teaching, learning, and assessment within an I-Search unit look like in practice and how this relates to technology use, content-area standards, and current theories of education
• how to promote successful implementation by having facilitators and administrators create the supportive structures that teachers need to engage in cycles of curriculum design, implementation, and evaluation.

Based on 10 years' work with middle schools and interdisciplinary teams, this book shows teachers and students asking real-life questions, searching for answers, and presenting their new understanding of "overarching concepts" from the effect of overfishing on a region's economy, to the social and emotional effects of natural disasters, to the health implications of water pollution. (Available for purchase online at http://shop.ascd.org/productdisplay.cfm?productid=198180. Non-member price is $18.95.)

Using the Internet to Promote Inquiry-based Learning
© 2000-2002 by Internet Innovations, Incorporated
http://www.biopoint.com/inquiry/ibr.html \

This article, authored by D. S. Jakes (2002), describes a structured approach to inquiry-based learning that uses the World Wide Web as a primary information resource. The approach consists of an intuitive 8-step process that begins with an essential question and ends with a knowledge product produced by students, typically completed in a cooperative setting. The skills required by students and teachers to make inquiry-based learning using the Internet a successful endeavor are discussed. The four components of a project including the scenario, the task, the resources and the product, are outlined. The author also offers the use of an electronic tool called MyProjectPages to facilitate the process.

Virtual Design Center
© 1999-2005 by Wheeling Jesuit University/Center for Educational Technologies
http://vdc.cet.edu/main.htm

The Virtual Design Center provides resources and guidelines for designing learning activities for scientific inquiry. The principles of the Virtual Design Center are based on contemporary educational research and guided by the experts of various disciplines. The site offers:

• eight research summaries that support the principles of the Virtual Design Center
• an opportunity to participate in a discussion forum about inquiry-based learning
• a six step guided process (with stated goals and objectives, linked research summaries, diagrams, examples and more) for designing an inquiry-based learning activity. (Note: although designed to support the development of inquiry-based learning activities that align with NASA science and national standards, the process can be generalized for use in the design of many types of inquiry-based learning activities.

Samples of some of the NASA inquiry-based modules created can be found at the Student Observation Network at http://son.nasa.gov/index.php.

YouthLearn
© 2001-2003 Education Development Center, Inc.
http://www.youthlearn.org/learning/approach/inquiry.asp

Through a strategic partnership between the Morino Institute (http://www.morino.org/) and the Education Development Center, Inc. (http://www.edc.org) YouthLearn is a growing nonprofit initiative to advance the education and well-being of young people through youth-driven, technology-infused learning.

An inquiry-based technology-infused collaborative approach is promoted by YouthLearn. The YouthLearn site offers a brief but informative introduction to inquiry-based learning, outlining its key principles and advantages. Tips and links to related resources enhance this introduction. Check out the additional topics "How to Create an Inquiry-based Project", "The Art of Asking Good Questions" and "A Collaborative Approach to Learning" found at the end of the introduction.