Inquiry in the Primary Classroom

In week 10 of this course we discussed the importance of using inquiry as a learning tool in the primary classroom. When I thought of inquiry prior to this discussion, I thought of it as asking questions to your students that generates discussion, but in reality inquiry is much more than that; it provides students with the ability to investigate, explore and search while enhancing their learning through involvement in a community of learners (Kuklthau, Maniotes & Caspari, 2007). I believe that inquiry-based learning is a great strategy to use in the classroom at any age because it allows students to explore their learning and gives them some freedom to drive their own learning which has the ability to lead to them being more engaged in the classroom. Although inquiry gives students some opportunity to drive the direction of their learning, it is not solely student driven. It is important for teachers to act as a guide; to direct learning and to introduce ideas that are not brought up in discussion (L. Lane, personal communication, March 16, 2016). As discussed in lecture, I believe that a great way to start literacy based learning is to introduce it at the beginning of the school year and develop a basis of respectful classroom discussion that teaches students how to take into account different perspectives and teaches them about constructive criticism. Once a basis of inquiry and its respectful use is put in place, a unit can begin with inquiry by introducing the topic students and having them generate questions about what they want to learn from that unit and ways that they could find answers to these questions through discussion, research, experimentation or investigation.

Another important aspect of inquiry is reflection. In all forms of learning I believe that it is important to provide students to the opportunity to reflect on what they learning as this allows for them and the teacher to monitor progress and allow learning and understanding of a topic to deepen. Reflection on inquiry can be done through a journal, by completing the “L” in a KWL chart about what they have learned since they posed their questions at the beginning of the unit, or by having students complete exit cards about what they have learned from the lesson of the day and what they are still unsure about.

The above video shows an example of inquiry based learning in a second grade questions where students are looking to answer the question “what businesses are in our community and what services do they provide?” This question comes from the social studies curriculum and lead to media lessons, research and presentations using iPads and by collaborating with their peers. 

Teaching Financial Literacy

With the curriculum of schooling ever growing, and the definition of what is considered literacy constantly expanding, being considered a literate person has become far more complicated than just knowing how to read and right. As 21^st century is literacies is broken down in my previous blog, and has continued to be done in my courses at Brock, I have come to learn that the about nine forms of literacy that must be addressed in the classroom. Although most of these literacies are topics and skills that I myself as a student have gained, at least in some form, throughout my education, one literacy that have very rarely been taught about myself is financial literacy. As a future teacher, this is a topic I fear, one that I feel I am not prepared teach as I still struggle myself to understand what is involved in finances and can barely imagine learning how to do them. Financial literacy was not something that was discussed throughout my primary and secondary educational experiences. We were taught about how to save money, how to invest, about taxes or mortgages, which are things that are important for my future students to understand; so how will I teach it?

http://moneyasyougrow.org/
This website provide students with financial literacy based on their age and provides a guide for teachers about what students should know at what age to be financially intelligent. 

According to Blue, Grootenboer and Brimble (2014) the importance of financial literacy education is to create a foundation for effective decision making. It is the job of schools and educators to teach students about earning income, buying goods and services, saving, using credit, financial investing and protecting and insuring. The goal here is to create able students who plan and set goals when making and assessing decisions. financial education is the key to creating financially literate youth and it needs to begin in primary and secondary school as today children and youth are growing up in a society where money is increasingly invisible through the use of debit and credit cards, and money is able to be spent at all hours of the day as a result of online shopping (Blue et al., 2014).

With the teaching of financial literacy education becoming mandatory and the substantial knowledge that students are expected to know I am left feeling more uncomfortable and unknowledgeable as ever. Although I understanding what is involved in the financial literacy curriculum, I still do not know how to teach it or explain it in terms that make sense to primary students.

The below video provided me with some perspective on how to start teaching financial literacy early in education, and how to engage students in learning by making it relevant to them. It discusses how financial literacy can teach young students about financial literacy can break the cycle of poverty. The school presented in the video teaches financial literacy to their students by relating to their everyday life, to decisions they have to make or will have to make in the future. For example in this school in the first grade they discuss personal finance, in the second grade is a combinanation of economics and personal finance and third grade is about monetary policy and what money is, while in older grades it becomes more fluid to make the information relevant.

Although my knowledge has expanded I still believe that it is important that teachers are provided with professional development to ensure that they are teaching financial literacy properly, and that this professional development is kept up to date as the economy changes. 

References

Blue, L., Grootenboer, P., & Brimble, M. (2014). Financial literacy education in the curriculum: Making the grade or missing the mark?. International Review of Economics Education, 16, 51-62. 

21st Century Literacies

In the first week of this course a quote was presented to us that I believe represents the meaning of literacy in a 21^st century learning environment. According to Carrington and Robinson (2009) “literacy is not just about decoding marks on a page, it is also about performing social acts of meaning, where meaning and practices vary according to context.” In my opinion this quote brings up a more complex meaning of literacy that looks beyond the basic definition of reading and writing and rather at the implications of literacy that come from reading and writing and extends beyond into social contexts. To me this means that upon learning the basic skills of literacy, students must learn to apply literacy into multiple contexts including global, financial, critical, environmental, media, etc. In order to this, students must have an understanding of social contexts so they are able to interpret a situation and apply their knowledge effectively which will allow for their actions to become more meaningful.

http://www.emergingedtech.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/21st-Century-Skills.jpg

In the beginning of every Ontario curriculum document, 21^st century learning is discussed with the government saying “today and in the future, students need to be critically literate, in order to synthesize information, make informed decisions, communicate effectively and thrive in an ever changing global community.” In reading this section it makes me think of the practical application of students learning. I believe that this quote is stressing the importance not only of teaching the required the curriculum, but also of providing children with real world examples that they are able to relate to their own lives to show them how what they are learning could be useful. By making students critically literate, and making lessons more suited to the needs of individuals I believe that students are more likely to be engaged in their learning and therefore will become more aware and contributing in different social contexts.

The above video discusses how literacy has begun to expand beyond understanding languages into multiple categories. Understanding these different literacies is becoming important due to the fact that people are beginning to communicate and interact internationally more often in ways where all kind of literacies are relevant in understanding social meaning. This video also discusses the importance of teachers keeping up with technology due to the fact that it is constantly changing and this will help students understand how to appropriately connect with the outside world. 

Tapping into the Learner's Motivation

            How can we keep our students engaged and motivated in their learning? This is a question that runs through the minds of all teachers as we see the presence of children who are all different in our classroom and as we see students begin to fade away during lessons that don’t draw their interest. When trying to answer this question, teachers are constantly looking for motivational strategies. According to Guilloteaux and Dornyei (2008) motivational strategies are instructional interventions applied by the teacher to elicit and stimulate motivation and self-regulating strategies that are purposefully used by students to manage their own level of motivation. According to Drake, Reid and Kolohon (2014) when you tap into a learner’s motivation it can also increase their engagement and the way assessment is delivered which is important due to links between motivation, effort and identity in the classroom. Motivation is important in sustaining the long and sometimes tedious learning process and is often created by classroom factors such as tasks, learning activities and instructional materials. In order for learners to display their motivated behaviours they must be motivated to a certain extent. This motivation is mainly shaped by the learning process, whether the activities/lessons presented are meaningful to them and whether the learners feel comfortable expressing their learning in the classroom (Huang, 2011).  In my opinion I believe that one of the most important factors in motivating students if providing them with information that is meaningful to them. I think that this strategy is more likely to draw in students attention as if they believe the content they are learning will benefit them or if it interests them, they are more likely to be motivated to put in their best effort. Edutopia presents four important strategies for helping students to regulate their motivation.



http://www.mindmapart.com/get-motivated-mind-map-jane-genovese/

            The video below is a Ted Talk presented by Peter Gardenfors on how to motivate students. Gardenfors begins this video by stating findings that say that the majority of high school students find school boring and uses this to discuss why this is and how we can change this. The main reason discussed for the reasoning students find school boring is hidden rules. Hidden rules are rules that are not explicitly stated, but are used in a way to make all students similar which consequently blocks motivation and does not allow everyone to fit in. Gardenfors believes that motivation is the way to change students thinking through curiosity, cooperation, control, peer learning and metacognition.

 

References

Drake, S.M., Reid, J.L., & Kolohon, W. (2014). Interweaving curriculum and classroom assessment: Engaging the 21^st century learner. Don Mills, ON: Oxford University Press.

Guilloteaux, M.J., & Dornyei, Z. (2008). Motivating language learners: A classroom-oriented investigation of the effects of motivational strategies on student motivation. Tesol Quarterly, 42(1), 55-77.

Huang, K.M. (2011). Motivating lessons: A classroom-oriented investigation of the effects of content-based instruction on EFL young learners motivated behaviours and classroom verbal interaction. Science Direct, 186-201.

Inquiry-Based Learning

                Inquiry-based learning uses a backwards design that interweaves assessment into curriculum and learning. An inquiry based classroom should promote create problem solving that is driven by student’s asking questions and gathering evidence to make sense of their world (Drake, Reid & Kolohon, 2014). When you enter an inquiry-based learning environment you should not expect a silent classroom with students sitting in rows, you should expect to hear the sound of students who are actively learning and engaged by asking questions, using critical thinking and problem solving. In this environment the teacher is not standing up at the front of the class lecturing, but is a rather a part of learning, acting as a guide in students exploration who using learning prompts, while also learning alongside the students (Wu, Tseng & Hwang, 2015). Inquiry-based learning should foster deep engagement in students that leads to constant collaborative learning (Sinha, Rogat, Adams-Wiggins & Hmelo-Silver, 2015). I believe that it is important for teachers to work towards inquiry-based learning because it offers the opportunity to move education away from standardized testing and towards an enriching environment that creates an educational community through collaboration. Inquiry-based learning is a constant cycle that encourages students to ask questions, investigate, create, discuss and reflect upon their learning. This cycle will allow for students interests to be incorporated into learning by teachers using questions as lesson prompts and will allow students to use their learning as a way to make sense of the world.

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/e9/60/f6/e960f695f9b8207a1b9b63bdc1010a7e.gif

 

The video below is a Ted Talk that was done by Brad Chumrau on inquiry-based learning. Brad taught in the German education system for four years where he was introduced to the idea as using the classroom as a sense of community and a place for collaboration. The Primary Year Program implemented in Germany forced teachers to collaborate to create relevant lessons which sky-rocketed student engagement.

 

Finally, this video shows a practical perspective on inquiry based learning in elementary classrooms from an elementary teacher and a program coordinator. It discusses how an inquiry-based learning environment is based on the curiosity of the students and that all students have this drive within them to always be questioning. The goal is to ignite passion within students by allowing them to explore something that they are interested in, with the teacher there as a guide for learning.

 

 

References

Drake, S.M., Reid, J.L., & Kolohon, W. (2014). Interweaving curriculum and classroom assessment: Engaging the 21^st century learner. Don Mills, ON: Oxford University Press.

Sinha, S., Rogat, T.K., Adams-Wiggins, K.R., & Hmelo-Silver, C.E. (2015). Collaborative group engagement in a computer supported inquiry learning environment. International Journal of Computer Supported Collaborative Learning, 10, 273-307. doi: 10.1007/s11412-015-9218-y

Wu, J.W., Tseng, J.C., & Hwang, G.J. (2015). Development of an inquiry-based learning support system based on an intelligent knowledge exploration approach. Educational Technology & Society, 18(3), 282-300.

 

 

Technology in the 21st Century Classroom

            “The twenty-first-century classroom is a connected networked classroom” (Drake, Reid & Kolohon, 2014, p.24). This is due to the increasing relevance of technology in education and the involvement of technology in everyday life. Although many schools are enthusiastic about bringing technology into the classroom, there are others who are cautious about it as it can become uncomfortable when students know more about it than teachers. Despite the presence of discomfort, resistance to integrating technology into the classroom can be detrimental to the learning of today’s students (Drake et al., 2014). Technology can be used to improve education by providing support to difficult subjects by integrating the interests of students. It can be useful for making teaching and learning easier by bringing a new and fun aspect to the classroom that enriches and deepens skills and motivates and engages students (Safitry et al., 2015). This can be shown through Blooms Digital Taxonomy which shows through the below pyramid how technology can be implemented through each aspect of education using different tools and websites (Drake et al., 2014).

           With the increasing relevance of technology it is important that teachers are provided with the opportunities to understand how to use developmental technologies in order to create a positive attitude towards them. This can be done through content based workshops that discuss how to integrate tools such as the internet, smartboards, computer simulations and educational software into lesson plans (Acikalin, 2014). It is important to me that teachers are properly trained in the use of these technologies because I did not grow up in a classroom that had access to resources like these. As a future teacher I hope to be able to utilize technology to adapt to my students individual learning needs and to create student interest in subjects they might otherwise not have an interest in. Concordia Online Education discusses five ways SMART boards can be used to improve learning in the classroom. I believe that technology in the classroom is also important because it allows for the use of virtual field trips which connect students to experts and other classrooms around the world. The video below is an example of a twenty-first-century grade one and two classroom that has widely integrated technology into their curriculum. This video shows how bringing technology into the classroom can bring joy to students learning by integrating their interests and providing them with access to material and experts beyond their teacher that would not be available without technology.  

                                                           References

Acikalin, F.S. (2014). Use of instructional technologies in science classrooms: Teachers' perspectives. The Turkish Online Journal of Educational Technology, 13(2), 197-201.

Drake, S.M., Reid, J.L., & Kolohon, W. (2014). Interweaving curriculum and classroom assessment. Don Mills, Canada: Oxford University Press.

Safitry, T.S., Mantoro, T., Ayu, M.A., Mayumi, I., Dewanti, R., & Azmeela, S. (2015). Teachers perspectives and practices in applying technology to enhance learning in the classroom. International Journal of Emerging Technologies in Learning, 10(3), 10-14. doi:10.3991/ijet.v10i3.4356