Carol Davis ED PS 6431 Dr.

Zheng Final Paper- Inquiry Teaching As an elementary school teacher, my goal for myself is to always be improving my teaching. I want my students to be successful and to love the learning process. One way that I can create this for my students is using inquiry based teaching. An inquiry based classroom provides many opportunities for students to actively learn through problem solving and reasoning skills, rather than a lecture a given by a teacher. Students are able to construct their own knowledge by forming and testing a hypothesis. In this process, the students are able to use their previous knowledge and tie it into current problems at hand. According to Collins (1983) using inquiry based teaching, teachers challenge the students more than by any other teaching method. Personally, as a student, when I was taught in an inquiry based format; I felt that I gained more knowledge. As an undergraduate student, I was required to take a science course. Every week we were given a problem solving based task. I recall most of what was taught in that course because of the way it was taught. My science teacher was always there for support, but never lectured. Collins (1983) described the process as in some sense the inquiry method models for the student the process of being a scientist. My science teacher let us think as a scientist as we worked through the many steps to come up with an answer. He understood the value of letting his students explore and problem solve. Most of my college courses, however, have not used the inquiry teaching model. It has always amazed me that many of my college professors would teach about how powerful inquiry

based learning is through a lecture. When a teacher lectures, students a great deal of the time are not engaged in the classroom and cannot recall most of what was talked about. I see this with my own students. The learning process needs to be a meaningful and exciting process for the learners. When all students are engaged in the learning process, it can be an exhilarating experience for the students (Collins, 1983). For my students to be successful in the future they must be able to problem solve and think on their own. Many times in the classroom students look to their teacher for all the correct answers to memorize to pass a test and then they quickly forget the information. Collins (1983) explains that using dialogues in the classroom is the effort teachers are making to get the students not to look to the teacher or the book for the correct answers, but rather to construct their own theories. The purpose of inquiry teaching is for the students to take learning to a deeper level, not to just skim the surface. In an effort to go deeper in my own classroom, I have found different ways for my students to learn and explore on their own. Technology is an amazing tool for students to do research. One thing I have done is create Webquests for my students. This internet based sight provides them with a problem that they must solve. The site has some helpful links where they can research the topic. After their research, they form a hypothesis on how to fix the problem on their own. Then they have the opportunity to present how they solved the problem to the class. They explain the reasons why they believe their hypothesis will work. My goal as an educator is to instill the love of learning to all of my students. I want my students to take an active role in their learning. I as their teacher do not know all the answers and I dont want them to think that I do. I want my students to have the chance to explore and

discover on their own. When students are not involved with their learning, they become passive bystanders in the learning process. When this occurs, the love of learning is no longer there. I try to create an environment where, students construct rules and theories by dealing with specific cases and apply these rules and theories to new cases (Collins, 1983). It is imperative for the students success in the future to know and use problem solving and reasoning skills. Inquiry based teaching is, in my option, the best way for students to gain those skills. In conclusion, an old Chinese proverb states, Tell me, Ill forget. Show me, Ill remember. Involve me, Ill understand. This is why inquiry based teaching is so important in the classroom. The goal of this type of teaching is that, students come out of the experience able to attack novel problems by applying these strategies themselves (Collins, 1983). To be able to have students college and career ready by the time they graduate from high school, they need to have a great deal of experience with reasoning and problem solving skills. This type of teaching requires all students to take charge of their own learning experience. They truly do absorb a great deal of knowledge from this format rather than by lecture.

Reference
Collins, A., & Stevens, A.L. (1983). A cognitive theory in inquiry teaching. In C.M. Reigeluth 195 (Ed.) Instructional-design theories and models: an overview of their current status. 196 Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Assoc. Publishers