Okay, here I am in the InquiryWorks! netcourse,
What have I gotten myself
into?? |
| The
teachers who have gone through the InquiryWorks! netseminar voiced ample evidence of
their successes as well as common concerns and challenges. The information that
follows, including quotes from previous InquiryWorks! participants, offers a brief tour of the course and hopefully
paves the way for your net journey. We're all competent subject
matter educators with ideas about what to do with curriculum and learning, but
moving to an inquiry focus means shifting attention and re-aligning goals. The
assumption revealed in the question posed by the inquisitive gardner in the
quotation - onions are for producing flowers - points to the real challenge
posed in this course: inquiry doesn't get seamlessly folded into current teaching
practice. To meet the new standards, current practice must undergo a profound
shift in both thinking and doing in the classroom. The purpose of onions, like
curriculum, may be for consumption and growth. A focus on 'nutrition' may be
more appropriate with students learning content by both creating and consuming
'salads' or 'onion soup'. It is inquiry in the content disciplines that enables
this kind of conceptual growth. InquiryWorks! provides a ramp, using existing tools,
for educators to refocus and bring inquiry into their classrooms.
Here are some questions or thoughts you may ask yourself:
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| We hope these voices from InquiryWorks! provided a personal view of
the course, its structure, rewards, and its challenges. Their experiences
and the commentary, we hope, can bring some ideas about 'recipes' for nutritious
inquiry in your classrooms. |
RETURN TO InquiryWorks! INTRODUCTION