We hear so often that learning is a journey or it's a marathon,
not a sprint either way.
It's something that takes time.
And when you think about a journey we think about going on a trip.
There's the planning, the booking of tickets, the packing, we do the research
before we even set out, and along the way we have experiences, we visit places,
we meet people.
And what do we do?
We take photos.
And in the old days, we'd ride diary entries and send postcards.
And nowadays we post our experiences on social media.
We share the experience digitally with our friends and family.
And then we get home and we reflect on what was, we may go through our
photos and tell retell, rather stories and some special experiences we had.
Well, learning's just the same.
We literally go on a journey.
It seems like such a lame word, but actually it is what it is.
Learning is a journey.
And just like a journey.
It flows.
In parts.
It gets stuck in others.
And sometimes it feels like forever before we reached the destination.
And other times you blink and it's over.
The learning journey also requires us to plan before we start and then
think about the experiences we want children to have along the way, and
finally, to assess or reflect on what was achieved and how we take it
further or what we'll do next time.
And as we go through the inquiry cycle, whether that be Kath Murdoch's
inquiry cycle or the five E model.
Which is engage, explore, explain, elaborate, and evaluate, we ourselves
and our learners are going to need some scaffolds or supporting material to
guide us along the way, because we don't just say, off you go, go and inquire.
We provide scaffolding and structures in place that our learners and ourselves feel
supported as we go along this journey.
There are tons of worksheets and booklets that learners can
use to help along this way.
And I actually have some of these on my website to help guide investigations,
but really a journal where children can capture their own experience
and their learning is just as good, if not better.
Where they can actually draw up their own columns or their own T-chart
or their own mind map or whatever organizer helps them to organize the
process of learning, the steps they take to their final destination, and
where they share what they've learned.
Documenting the inquiry or the learning journey is fundamental in
supporting this whole ongoing process.
But it also has a few other functions.
One.
It provides you with information to see what additional resources or provocations
or conversations you might need.
To sustain that learning journey.
Or perhaps you may need to correct any misconceptions.
Two.
It makes the learning visible so that learners can see the
value in the work they're doing.
But also it's a way for them to see the connections to other learning areas.
A way for parents to engage with the learning to.
Three documentation helps your planning.
It shows you the next steps where you can take the learning further and
what gaps you may still need to fill.
And how did you record this journey?
Well, I think it's helpful to always be thinking in terms of the inquiry cycle.
So if you think of your first step and inquiry it's tuning in
right or engaging the learner.
So, this is when you want to find out what the learner knows or
what they're thinking, or they wondering about a topic or a concept.
And here, things like your TWL chart or your T W H L chart often used either
as a whole class or individually.
And then they displayed in a visible space, like a learning wall or
perhaps in a learner's journal.
Now, if you listened to episode 26, my interview with Jessica Vance, she
spoke in detail about learning walls,
I highly recommend you listen to that episode if you haven't already.
Now, another way of tuning kids in is to use wonder clouds.
This is just a piece of paper cut out in a cloud shape.
And this is where children write down what they're wondering about.
This topic or concept that you're covering.
Or sometimes just anything, a personal project.
But if you're creating a learning wall, this would be the first piece
that you would pop up, and then as the journey unfolds, you add pieces
of evidence to this wall until you've eventually reached the point where
the learner can see whether or not they've uncovered the answer to their
wonderings through this inquiry process.
And as a whole class activity, the one thing I've always liked
doing is to create a huge mind map.
I collect all the students' responses in one color.
And then as you go along the inquiry process and uncover answers to
or misconceptions, I add it to the mind map in another color.
So, I guess you could also add sticky notes to it and responses to show that
you've answered or confirmed a wondering or a statement or whatever it was.
As you go along the inquiry, you more than likely have a visual
organizer for each learner, so that they know what information they need
to gather as they proceed through.
I have a visual organizer for an inquiry project on life cycles and animals on
my website, and I leave a link in the show notes so you can go and get that by
clicking on the link after this episode.
Or you might be having conversations with children.
That's another way to record their wonderings and their thinking.
And you do this, especially in early childhood.
But of course it's equally valid for older students too.
And so you either record your conversation or annotate a drawing or a diagram or a
piece of work, or even a photograph of the child participating in the process.
And then you would display this up on your learning wall, or
you could even attach a QR code.
Which links to your conversation, which is stored in a file somewhere.
It could be on Seesaw or in Dropbox, or even a private YouTube account.
And so you'll go along this process and you'll include all these parts
of the learners learning journey.
So that it all becomes visible, and the child can then see the connection and
experience that joy and satisfaction that comes from recognizing where
they started and where they've ended.
And they also witnessed their own progress.
And another wonderful tool of course, is the floor book, which Dr. Claire Warden
the founder of the floor book spoke about in our interview, which was in episode 24.
So that's another episode for you to go and listen to, if you haven't already.
And the floor book is also a tool for making, learning visible.
And it's also a planning tool and a way of documenting the learning process and
to find possible lines of inquiry, to take learners deeper into their learning.
And of course you'll be linking multiple curriculum areas because
inquiry isn't a separate subject.
So you will be explicitly teaching report writing, for example, as
part of your English curriculum, or for very young learners, it
could just be a word or a sentence.
And so perhaps you also have your rough draft of the report with annotations
and then finally the end product.
But of course it just never ends there because after that comes your
discussion and more questions, So that the learner becomes aware of the
limitations and what they could still include or other lines of inquiry
they may need to think about.
And that's when you could have a self evaluation sheet or reflection sheet,
where a learner can think about what they did well or what didn't go well,
what they would do differently next time,
or perhaps it's just their first thoughts or changes they made in their thinking,
and then their final revised thinking.
I hope you can see from this that inquiry isn't a boring static lesson where
you ask a question and in the students go off and they fill in a worksheet.
Inquiry, is a living breathing process that mimics real life problem solving and
it's applicable to all curriculum areas.
And throughout this process, we, as educators are also recording our
own observations of our learners.
We're looking to see who needs more scaffolding, who needs stretching, who
needs help with collaboration, who needs help with making their thinking visible.
And I've created inquiry and investigation record planning
sheets to help you keep track of the behaviors and skills that learners are
acquiring on the website, by going to resources.edslessons.com/inquiryandinvestigationrecordplanner.
It's a bit of a mouthful
so I'll put a link in the show notes for you so you can easily
just click there and get it.
And I also have an integrating inquiry planning template for you
that helps you plan a unit or concept, so you could easily think about
integrating it across curriculum.
So you're ticking off more than one curriculum outcome and
making your job so much easier.
Now if you would like more strategies and insights, just like these delivered
to your inbox, then you should subscribe to my free weekly newsletter,
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My subscribers get access to all the juicy bits and insider
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slash forward slash.
Get curious., I'll link it in the show notes too.
Now, I just want to thank you all for listening to blooming curious.
I know you could so easily, I've listened to one of a thousand podcasts
out there, but you chose this one.
And for that I'm so grateful and thrilled.
So thanks so much.
And if anything, in today's episode resonates with you, could you please
tap the share button and share it with friends and colleagues that
you think will find it useful too
I would so appreciate that.
And I hope that with these episodes lately, you can really see that inquiry
is definitely not a separate subject.
And it's not something that replaces explicit instruction, which is something
that so many people are so fearful of.
Inquiry is the mindset.
And inquiry is the only way that I know of, and then I've experienced
how children really get stuck in and love learning, even those that
really don't like it at the beginning.
I promise you give this a go.
So go and sign up to my weekly newsletter, and get on the mailing list
so that you can get all the insider information regarding inquiry and how to
integrate it into your existing lessons.
So with that, I'll love and leave you.
Until next time, remember to stay blooming, curious.