Questionnaire 3 an art form!

Third and final questionnaire

Questionnaire 3

Image by Satane

Made it!

1. Take some time to think about your topic. Now write down what you know about it.

  Inquiry based learning with year 3 students undertaking historical research:

·       Needs to be approached from narratives as children naturally relate to the stories of others and can more easily relate their understandings in story form to others.

·       Should start with the bigger concepts like change so that children won’t just be focused on acquiring and memorising facts. This is a concept based approach. The teacher can help the students to formulate questions to guide them in their searching. In this way the learning is child-centred and will enable a deeper level of meaning to be attained.

·       Should be a guided process. It is critical for the teacher to provide intervention along the way to enable the students to keep moving forward to find answers to their questions.

·       The Inquiry based learning activity should provide opportunities for students to share their work with one another and provide feedback to help each other with the task. Students who work collaboratively in this way learn a great deal more than in an individual task but the right guidance and intervention by the teacher is imperative in this process.

2. How interested are you in this topic?  A great deal

3. How much do you know about this topic? Quite a bit

4. Thinking back on your research project, what did you find easiest to do? Please list as many things as you like.

·       In the final stages of the inquiry I can now reflect and identify that it became easier once I had clarified and formulated a focus for my search. That wasn’t particularly easy to do but after that I felt that I had direction and a real purpose.

5. Thinking back on your research project, what did you find most difficult to do? Please list as many things as you like.

·       I found it difficult to keep track of the information I collected. I really lacked a system of organisation and at the end I wished I’d had one.

·       I found it difficult to get past the stage of formulating my focus. I seemed to be searching aimlessly for information for a long time and this created confusion and frustration.

·       I found it difficult to start!

6. What did you learn in doing this research project? Please list as many things as you like.

·       In researching this topic, I have personally learnt the value of reflection and evaluation at each stage of the inquiry process. This will help me to be more aware of the way in which I can support students and intervene with strategies to help them.

·       This type of questionnaire is very useful to use with children. It helps to identify what they know at the outset of the research and to keep track of their progress as the unit evolves. It would be a useful tool when trying to identify intervention strategies that would be most beneficial to students to keep them moving with their inquiry.

·       I have come to truly appreciate the value of inquiry-based learning. It is student focused and a far more motivating and engaging way for students to learn. It personalises the learning and provides the approach to differentiate student learning to suit the needs of the learner.

·       In doing the research project, I have gained more confidence in using inquiry learning. I feel more capable of implementing inquiry based units with students and adapting information literacy models to suit students.

·       This project has also given me the confidence to promote inquiry based learning with colleagues and to be able to provide the support for classroom teachers in implementing inquiry units with their classes.