Looking back over this semester, I really do feel like I have learned a lot. Initially when asked to summarize my “learning about learning”, my eyes rolled. Everyone’s did. It has been a whirlwind of a semester – it honestly feels like we just started and yet here we are at the end of the term! Thinking harder about that question, and not forcing myself to put my answer into terms of core competencies or other prescriptive answers, I actually feel like I have learned a LOT over the past 3 months. One of the most significant parts of my learning, actually has taken place around inquiry projects. When I first started the program, I was very focused on what I will be teaching students. The content, what will units be on, what types of lessons will I create for what topics… and then going through the program, that has shifted to now focusing on why I am teaching a particular unit, what am I trying to achieve with this content, what am I trying to get students to know. Along with this, came my understandings about inquiry projects. Again, that word rolls around our cohort in quotations, you hear it so much. However, in my Social Studies class, an assignment that resonated with me was a Community Connections Mini Unit plan – and now I realize it has given me a deeper appreciation of the word inquiry.
We were tasked with going out into the community and finding a place that we would want to take our students on a field-trip. We had to create a mini unit plan that builds up to or around this field trip – but those were our only guidelines. The specific course (within Social Studies), grade, and activities/games/lectures…everything was entirely up to us. We had guidelines, but we had choice. This mini unit plan turned out to be one of the most engaging things I created and participated in this semester. My partner and I went to the mosque here in Victoria, and learned about Islam and the media misconceptions, stereotypes around the faith, and just general information from the Imam at the mosque! It was an incredible experience! We spent over two hours there, learning from the Imam, and other men and women who were so excited to share their knowledge, faith, and generosity with us. It was the most engaging experience, and I learned so much from it – both about religion (from a student perspective) as well as about how students learn (from a teacher perspective). Choice matters for students. As the teacher, giving them guidelines to work within, but allowing students to choose what to research or learn about and how they want to do it, really increases engagement exponentially. Increasing that power of choice by encouraging place based, and multimodal learning. Going out into the community on a field trip and actually experiencing what you’re reading and writing about is so instrumental for learning. Inquiry based learning now doesn’t have quotations around it any more for me, I actually see how valuable it is. I saw it in PSII but seeing it also in my own learning and practice has really solidified it for me. Allowing students to be in control of what they learn and how really is a (if not THE) key aspect of how I want to teach.
