We are three practicing educators who are participating in a curriculum and instruction course investigating inquiry learning. Katie Bridges is a 7th-grade geography teacher at Urbana Middle School. Tom Appenzeller is a science teacher at Mahomet - Seymour Junior High. Marian McPhee is a 5th-grade teacher at South Side School in Champaign. We came together because we work with a common age group. Our task was to create a research project, we brainstormed a study that would allow us to investigate and improve our practice.
We intend to compare teaching practices across grade levels, as well as, across curriculum. The intent is to compare structured techniques, with the more exploratory based inquiry learning/teaching style. Cooperative groups will be used as a common denominator for both styles of learning activities. We posed these questions to guide us in our investigation: 1) How do both teachers and students feel about the two learning experiences? 2) Are outcomes influenced by grade level, curriculum, and setting? 3) Is there a difference when the processes are presented in different sequence?
The sequence of this project was purposely arranged so that two members launched their inquiry with the structured activity . The other member completed the inquiry-style activity first. The intent for changing the order was to examine whether the sequence would affect the outcomes of the activities. Tom and Katie used the structured style in their first cooperative group activity. Marian started with inquiry. Between the two experiences there was a time lag of about a month. We culminated both of the activities with student classroom presentations. Teachers and students reflected on both experiences through questions, discussion, and interviews.
Marian McPhee: Fifth Grade Activity
Tom Appenzeller: Sixth Grade Activity
Katie Bridges: Seventh Grade Activity
We will reflect on two of our original questions.
*Does order affect the activity?
The order did not seem to affect the performance during the student presentations. We had anticipated that students would mimic whatever they had experienced during their first cooperative group session. From Phase I to Phase II most of the presentations were unique.
*Will age or curriculum influence the outcome?
There is a significant difference in the range of maturity between the ages of eleven to thirteen. We discovered that the younger students tended to spend large amounts of time trying to emulate the teacher's instructional style. It did not seem to matter whether it was a structured or inquiry style method. While the older students, seventh graders, worried little about modeling the teacher, instead were compelled to present interesting, creative, and fun activities for their classmates. The need to please peers is a primary motivation.
Curriculum differences did not seem to affect the outcomes of the activity. Two of the projects were based on a Social Studies unit, the other was Science. We concluded that the curriculum matter did not influence the students ability to research a topic, gather and condense information, and then present.
We feel that this study helped us to try methods that we would not have attempted otherwise. This has allowed us to have new confidence to explore inquiry teaching styles. The student feedback has assured us that the freedom of implementing new strategies within the curriculum will ensure meaningful student learning. This opportunity has allowed us to examine our own teaching practices. Examination is the first step towards change and improvement.
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