There is a lot of great educational research out there. You can get ideas from books, articles, Twitter and colleagues. They can sound like amazing ideas! The science can be compelling.
Enquiry to me is about finding out if those great ideas work for you, in your class, in your school, with the people you teach. Because whilst ideas may well work in theory and in other contexts there may well be something about your situation that means that your idea won’t work. Enquiry lets you figure that out in a controlled measured way. You can dip your metaphorical toe into the water and find out if it is worth going for a swim, rather than jumping in and getting a fright because the water is freezing.
This means that enquiry can save you time, effort and heartbreak if your idea doesn’t work compared to just going full on. But better yet enquiry lets you share your findings with condifence. Other teachers can look at what you did, what worked, what didn’t work, and adapt that to their own circumstances. That type of ‘real world’ experience is invaluable and absolutely worth doing.
I like the idea of enquiry being an initial tester, Chris. It gets over the fact that sometimes an enquiry can lead to further, different or related questions and also can sometimes lead to nothing much. I also like the idea of sharing with confidence. How confident do you think teachers are as a profession?
Some of us are very confident of course, but as a profession I’d describe teachers as quite meek. A lot of resigned acceptance and ‘I guess we have to’ (or at least in my experience).
Hi Chris,
One of the co-facilitators on the STL residential talked about using the term “a small taste of change”, which I really liked because as you rightly say that initial dipping your toe can help you decide to go forwards or in a completely new direction.
Do you think as a profession we often hold back a bit on sharing our ideas? What do you think would help us create a culture of collaborative professionalism and help take us forward in our enquiry process and professional learning?
Thanks,
Gill
I think there is an emerging culture of sharing and discussion, fuelled by social media mostly. You don’t see much of it in person (unless of course you go to a pedagoo event!). To see it in schools staff need to be trusted, given the time to research, experiment, research and discuss. I think departmental meetings are a perfect place for this type of thing!
I agree – we have a standing item on our DM agenda devoted to “Positive Outcomes” where we share good practice and ideas (we devote longer to this if anyone has been involved in external CLPL sessions / courses)
We also have a Professional Learning group where staff volunteer to deliver lunchtime / after-school sessions – this academic session, this involves:
* Active Learning (Rip it and run)
* GLOW Mailing Groups
* Kahoot
* Plickers
* Differentiation (this was mine!!)
* Using one note in GLOW
* Poll Everywhere
* Flip Learning
* Restorative Meetings
* Quizlet and Quizlet Live
* Guided Discovery Learning
* Motivating Reluctant Learners
* Peer Learning
* Prezi
* Virtual Learning
* Wellbeing
And a session on SCEL TLP and the SCEL framework…..delivered by yours truly….. 🙂
Gill
Wow! That’s such a valuable attitude! And from the sounds of it it seems well received 🙂
Oh, I really like that analogy! It takes the pressure off the enquiry process, as something that doesn’t necessarily have to “work”.
I’d say that sharing something that didn’t work (and why) is just as useful as something that did work, if not more so!