Doing Authentic Inquiry To Improve Learning And Teaching

Suited for students of educational research and researchers and practitioners involved in teaching and learning, teacher education, and policy. Readers experience potentially transformative research that is applicable to today’s challenges.

Using a sociocultural approach to critical action research, this book is a primer in doing reflexive, authentic inquiry research in teaching and learning for educators as teacher | researchers. Rather than the artificial dichotomy between theory and practice, the roles of teacher and researcher are instead seen in a dialectic relationship (indicated by the symbol | in teacher | researcher) in which each informs and mediates the other in the process of revising and generating new knowledge that is of benefit to those being researched. In addition to providing a theoretical foundation for authentic inquiry, Being a Teacher | Researcher provides a detailed framework with ideas and strategies that interested educators can apply in exploring teaching and learning in both formal and informal settings. It provides concrete examples of how to use authentic inquiry as a basis for collaborating with others to improve the quality of teaching and learning while cogenerating new theory and associated practices that bridge what has been described as a theory-practice divide. Included in this book are how to plan and carry out authentic inquiry studies, choosing appropriate methodologies, methods of data collection and analysis, negotiating research with human participants, using authenticity criteria and characteristics, and addressing challenges and conflicts for teacher | researchers. As a primer, this book serves the needs of many different populations including prospective and practicing teachers, teacher educators, beginning researchers and seasoned researchers who are making changes to what and how they research.

Using a sociocultural approach to critical action research, this book is a primer in doing reflexive, authentic inquiry research in teaching and learning for educators as teacher - researchers. Rather than the artificial dichotomy between theory and practice, the roles of teacher and researcher are instead seen in a dialectic relationship (indicated by the symbol "-" in teacher - researcher) in which each informs and mediates the other in the process of revising and generating new knowledge that is of benefit to those being researched. In addition to providing a theoretical foundation for authentic inquiry, Being a Teacher - Researcher provides a detailed framework with ideas and strategies that interested educators can apply in exploring teaching and learning in both formal and informal settings. It provides concrete examples of how to use authentic inquiry as a basis for collaborating with others to improve the quality of teaching and learning while cogenerating new theory and associated practices that bridge what has been described as a theory-practice divide. Included in this book are how to plan and carry out authentic inquiry studies, choosing appropriate methodologies, methods of data collection and analysis, negotiating research with human participants, using authenticity criteria and characteristics, and addressing challenges and conflicts for teacher - researchers. As a primer, this book serves the needs of many different populations including prospective and practicing teachers, teacher educators, beginning researchers and seasoned researchers who are making changes to what and how they research.

Want to make learning more meaningful in your classroom? Looking to better prepare your students for the world of tomorrow? Keen to help learners create authentic connections to the world around them? Dive into Inquiry beautifully marries the voice and choice of inquiry with the structure and support required to optimise learning for students and get the results educators desire. With Dive into Inquiry you'll gain an understanding of how to best support your learners as they shift from a traditional learning model into the inquiry classroom where student agency is fostered and celebrated each and every day. This book strikes a perfect balance of meaningful pedagogy, touching narrative, helpful processes, original student examples, and rich how-to lesson plans all to get you going on bringing inquiry into your classroom. After reading this book educators will feel equipped to design their own inquiry units in a scaffolded manner that promote a gradual shift of control of learning from the teacher to the learner. Exploring student passions, curiosities, and interests and having these shape essential questions, units of study, and performance tasks are all covered in this powerful book. Learn to keep track of the many inquiry topics in your classroom and have students take ownership over their learning like never before! Trevor MacKenzie provides readers with a strong understanding of the Types of Student Inquiry and proposes a framework that best prepares both educators and learners for sharing the unpacking of curriculum in the classroom as they work together towards co-constructing a strong Free Inquiry unit. Helpful illustrations for in-class use, examples of essential questions from a variety of disciplines, practical goals for making progress in adopting inquiry into your practice, and powerful student learning on display throughout, Dive into Inquiry will energize, inspire, and transform your classroom!

Create a thinking classroom that helps students move from the factual to the conceptual Concept-Based Inquiry is a framework for inquiry that promotes deep understanding. The key is using guiding questions to help students inquire into concepts and the relationships between them. Concept-Based Inquiry in Action provides teachers with the tools and resources necessary to organize and focus student learning around concepts and conceptual relationships that support the transfer of understanding. Step by step, the authors lead both new and experienced educators to implement teaching strategies that support the realization of inquiry-based learning for understanding in any K–12 classroom.

Humans, especially children, are naturally curious. Yet, people often balk at the thought of learning scienceâ€"the "eyes glazed over" syndrome. Teachers may find teaching science a major challenge in an era when science ranges from the hardly imaginable quark to the distant, blazing quasar. Inquiry and the National Science Education Standards is the book that educators have been waiting forâ€"a practical guide to teaching inquiry and teaching through inquiry, as recommended by the National Science Education Standards. This will be an important resource for educators who must help school boards, parents, and teachers understand "why we can't teach the way we used to." "Inquiry" refers to the diverse ways in which scientists study the natural world and in which students grasp science knowledge and the methods by which that knowledge is produced. This book explains and illustrates how inquiry helps students learn science content, master how to do science, and understand the nature of science. This book explores the dimensions of teaching and learning science as inquiry for K-12 students across a range of science topics. Detailed examples help clarify when teachers should use the inquiry-based approach and how much structure, guidance, and coaching they should provide. The book dispels myths that may have discouraged educators from the inquiry-based approach and illuminates the subtle interplay between concepts, processes, and science as it is experienced in the classroom. Inquiry and the National Science Education Standards shows how to bring the standards to life, with features such as classroom vignettes exploring different kinds of inquiries for elementary, middle, and high school and Frequently Asked Questions for teachers, responding to common concerns such as obtaining teaching supplies. Turning to assessment, the committee discusses why assessment is important, looks at existing schemes and formats, and addresses how to involve students in assessing their own learning achievements. In addition, this book discusses administrative assistance, communication with parents, appropriate teacher evaluation, and other avenues to promoting and supporting this new teaching paradigm.

Assessment has provided educational institutions with information about student learning outcomes and the quality of education for many decades. But has it informed practice and been fully incorporated into the learning cycle? Conrad and Openo argue that the potential inherent in many of the new learning environments being explored by educators and students has not been fully realized. In this investigation of a variety of assessment methods and learning approaches, the authors aim to discover the tools that engage learners and authentically evaluate education. They insist that moving to new learning environments, specifically those online and at a distance, afford opportunities for educators to adopt only the best practices of traditional face-to-face assessment while exploring evaluation tools made available by a digital learning environment in the hopes of arriving at methods that capture the widest set of learner skills and attributes.

How might inquiry enhance the professional practice of student and practising teachers, teacher educators and other practitioners? What effect might this have on the learning of young people in and outside of the classroom? Based on the findings of an international colloquium and drawing upon a range of practices from the UK, USA, Canada, Europe and Australia, this book is designed to make explicit the connections between Practitioner Inquiry and Teacher Professional Learning in Initial Teacher Education and Ongoing Teacher Professional Development. Considering issues such as the relationship between practitioner inquiry and pedagogical content knowledge whether it is possible to scale up from small local and intensive innovations to more broadly-based inquiry inquiry’s role in professional identity, both individual and communal prevailing socio-political contexts and consequences for social policy formation. It brings together writers who work in designing teacher education courses, and those who are practice-based researchers and policy makers. Crucially, many of these writers inhabit both spheres, and their accounts of how they successfully combine their multiple roles will prove vital reading for all those involved in examining and improving practice leading to enhanced teacher professional learning.