4 R’S OF REFLECTION

QUESTION

You should make some brief notes notes on the potential advantages and disadvantages of approaching teaching in the manner outlined in these articles. You may like to scaffold your journal response by using the 4 R’s of reflecton:

Report– At this stage you describe, report or re-tell the key elements of what you have learnt, seen or experienced.

Relate – You should identify aspects of the observation which have personal meaning or connect with your experience. Then you should relate these to your own strengths, improvements which could be made, mistakes or experiential learning are recorded. You may also identify something you need or plan to do or change.

Reason – You should explore the relationship between theory and practice and seek a deep understanding of why something has happened. You can explore or analyse a concept, event or experience by asking questions and looking for answers,

considering alternatives and multiple perspectives.

Reconstruct – You should be able to generalize and/or apply your learning to other contexts and future professional practice. This may involve developing general principles, formulating personal theories of teaching or taking a stand or position on an issue.

Murdoch, K., (2004). ‘What makes a good inquiry unit?’

http://www.eqa.edu.au/site/whatmakesagoodinquiry.html

Autumn 2004

Talking English

What makes a good inquiry unit?

KATH MURDOCH discusses the characteristics of high quality inquiry units—that is, units that achieve their goal of engaging students and helping them to learn skills and gain understanding.

INQUIRY APPROACHES are enjoying a resurgence of popularity in classrooms across Australia. Many contemporary curriculum frameworks such as Tasmania’s Essential Learnings locate inquiry as central to effective teaching and learning. One of the ways inquiry can be activated in the classroom is through units of work that involve students in investigating shared topics or questions over several weeks. These units often provide a valuable context for teaching a wide range of literacy skills and processes, as well as developing understandings about the world.

Teachers have been planning inquiry units for years and there are various models and ways to do so. But do our units really achieve the kind of thinking and learning they should? In this article, I describe several elements that repeatedly appear in the most successful units and argue that it is the conversations we have around such questions that ultimately strengthen our teaching. The list is by no means exhaustive. It is a series of ‘discussion starters’ that may help other teams get the most out of their planning.

What’s this unit really about?

Teachers who build their planning around big ideas are well on the way to a great inquiry unit. Whether teacherselected or negotiated with students, the best topics engage students in learning about significant, robust and transferable ideas. At Hawthorn West Primary School, teachers use Tina Blythe’s concept of ‘throughlines’ to help ensure the generative quality of their units. For example, a recent, whole school unit celebrating the school’s 150th anniversary was geared around the following, shared throughlines:

• constructed and natural environments change over time
• people and their relationships are constantly changing
• knowing about and understanding the past can help us understand the present and make informed choices for the future.

Clarity of purpose and a shared vision of ‘what this unit is all about’ makes an enormous difference to the quality of a unit. Developing and articulating these visions with each other and with students establishes a stronger sense of shared purpose.

But will the students care? How can we engage them emotionally?

When we ask students to reflect on their most significant moments in an inquiry they repeatedly identify activities that involve real people, real places, real objects and the stories that surround them. Those units that ‘fall flat’ often do so because we fail to connect students with the emotional terrain around a topic. So how do we improve this? Choosing units that involve problematic questions and issues is one way. For example, instead of studying ‘the sea’ as a passive topic, we activate it through questions, for example, ‘Why is the sea important to humans and other animals? How and why do people value the sea?’

Another powerful strategy is to ensure that students gather information from direct experience and stories. As part of their inquiry into reconciliation, year 5/6 students at Princes Hill primary school invited Kutcha Edwards to share what life is like for him as an Indigenous Australian. His challenging and personal story activated an emotional connection with the topic many students had not experienced before. For some, it was only at this point where they began to ask (and care about) questions. Students’ own stories are a rich source of emotive power. To begin their unit of work on memory and change, prep students at Hawthorn West Primary School shared an object they regarded as a ‘treasure’ from their past. Both students and teachers were emotionally engaged as we listened to the stories behind wornout teddies and yellowing baby blankets, and from here, the inquiry took off.

Why are we doing this? Is there a real issue or problem that might give the unit an authentic purpose?

Dewey wrote extensively of the need for learning to take place in purposeful, reallife contexts. Almost a century later, we still fail to fully capitalise on the many opportunities for authentic learning that exist within home, school and community. A problem or project can really drive and help sequence a successful inquiry. At Ringwood Heights Primary, students helped design and build a small wetland area as part of the nature sanctuary near their school. Through the process, they learned about habitats and interdependence as well as gaining the skills involved in budgeting, locating materials and finding expert help. Great inquiry units work towards a goal. Students do something with what they learn—and that action can, in itself, make a real difference.

How can we help students make connections between learning areas?

Inquiry learning can happen very effectively within the scope of one key learning area. The best units, however, are those in which students connect learning across the curriculum. There are many reasons why this works so well. Perhaps the most salient is the opportunity this gives students for transfer—central to the development of understanding. During an inquiry into the science of light and sound, year 1/2 students at Kalinda Primary School invited a scientist to share his knowledge and answer their questions. As part of their literacy work, the students considered how he got his message across, how he made explanations clear to an audience and how he used props and visuals. Towards the end of the unit, the staff challenged the students to become the experts—to put on their own ‘light and sound’ expo through which they could teach others using both the scientific understandings and the literacy skills they had learned. To the students this integrated experience is seamless and sensible. For teachers, it requires forward thinking—looking for opportunities to make worthwhile curriculum connections.

Are there opportunities for choice and negotiation in this unit? When students are given genuine choices about what they will learn, how they will inquire and how they will show what they know—a unit has more chance of real success. Choices give students a higher ‘stake’ in the inquiry, a sense of ownership and an opportunity to work in ways that suit their learning style. Last year, year 3/4 students at Hawthorn West Primary School spent time researching the question: What makes my body work and how can I keep it working well? It was both impossible and unnecessary for all students to investigate all body systems and needs. Students negotiated questions of interest to them investigated these using a contract that provided support, checks and balances as they worked. At the end of their inquiry, roles were reversed as students taught each other what they had learned. Students show us time and time again that when they are given choices and some ‘room to move’ in a topic they take more responsibility for their learning and get so much more out of the unit.

Are we taking the students beyond the known? How challenging is this inquiry?

Many approaches to inquiry emphasise the importance of relating topics to students’ interests and their own questions. There is no doubt that when students perceive the topic to be relevant to their lives in some way, they are engaged and motivated. The quest for relevance can, however, be problematic. Some units are highly engaging, but when all is said and done the students have not been sufficiently challenged. A great unit is both relevant and challenging— students come away from it with new, deeper understandings and new questions. Keeping, comparing and discussing records of students’ thinking (for example, with mind maps and taped conversations) at critical stages in the unit can help ensure the bar remains high.

How will we help students (and ourselves) reflect on their learning?

Great units involve both students and teachers in regular, explicit reflection. A useful tool for this is the doubleentry journal. One side of the page is descriptive— recording what is being done as the inquiry unfolds. The other side documents reflections on and questions arising from those experiences. As they revisit and expand the journal, students and teachers become more mindful of their journey—of how, what and why they are learning and the connections between tasks. A good unit feels like a journey rather than a smorgasbord of related activities. Teachers model their own questions and reflections as they travel with students.

Let’s meet (and talk) again …

As the saying goes, ‘It’s not over until it’s over’. Often with the best intentions in mind, we plan a unit in detail before it has been taught, but then rarely refer to or discuss the plan again. A great unit has a deft mix of the planned and spontaneous, of deliberate, guided tasks and more organic, responsive teaching arising out of the interactions we have with students. A great unit is well framed from the outset (with big ideas, key questions, purposes, strategies for activating prior knowledge and shared experiences), but it is the continued conversations around these that help ensure the inquiry remains dynamic, connected to the students’ needs and a joy to teach.

Note:

My thanks to teachers at Hawthorn West, Ringwood Heights, Princes Hill and Kalinda Primary Schools for the continued privilege of sharing in your conversations.

References

Blythe, T & Associates (1998). The Teaching for Understanding Guide, CA JosseyBass, San Francisco.

Dewey, J (1910). How we think, Heath, Boston.

Kath Murdoch is an education consultant and fellow of the University of Melbourne.

The author owns the copyright in this article. For information related to the reuse of this work in any form please contact the publisher denise.quinn@curriculum.edu.au

Whitty, H., (2004). ‘Improving the odds’

http://www.eqa.edu.au/site/improvingtheodds.html

Summer 2004

Talking Maths

Improving the Odds

Teaching students to calculate risk could provide more benefits than simply improving their mathematics. HELEN WHITTY outlines a Powerhouse Museum online program with broad connections to the wider curriculum.

Mathematics is not just a ritualistic thing where black marks are moved around on a piece of paper—it’s a way of thinking and creative problem solving.

(Seymour Papert)

The Powerhouse Museum’s new online education program called Gambling: calculating the risk provides teachers with an innovative tool to teach mathematics within a real-world context and potentially connects this teaching with other syllabuses (Commerce, PDHPE) and into the broader school curriculum covering social skills, money management, seeking help and healthy lifestyles.

If you take the view that drug and sex education encourages anti-social behaviour then read no further. The developers were very conscious of the dangers of training young gamblers but felt that gambling, as a significant social issue, warranted some closer attention within a formal learning environment. Judged on expenditure (losses) per capita, Australians are the world’s leading gamblers. Gambling is one of the most distinctive aspects of Australian life. Over 80% of adult Australians participate in gambling. Expenditure on gambling has trebled in the last 15 years. At $15 billion per year ($1000 per adult; $1200 per adult in NSW), Australia’s gambling losses exceed its household savings.

A study undertaken by the Queensland Treasury (see www.aare.edu.au/02pap/cur02320.htm) points out that those under 18 years of age are most at risk for developing addictive patterns of behaviour, including problem gambling. Yet young people are unlikely to have the skills and strategies to manage their gambling and avoid personal and financial difficulties.

The Gambling: calculating the risk website rewards sound mathematical thinking with insights into the improbability of winning. It debunks many of the social myths surrounding gaming, while acknowledging the role gambling plays in our society. It positions gambling within the leisure industry, while encouraging students to make informed decisions on the best use of their leisure time and money.

The website repurposes a computer interactive developed by Sydney’s Powerhouse Museum for the Gambling in Australia; thrills, spills and social ills exhibition. After a six-month display, a smaller exhibition is touring to New South Wales regional galleries and museums.

Gambling is an activity found in most human societies. Dice games are especially antique, featuring in most ancient cultures including Egypt, China, Greece and Rome. Cards originated in China, Korea and Japan, and were apparently introduced to Europe by Marco Polo. As play replaced ritual as the major use of these artefacts, gambling heightened the role of the players and of chance.

During the Enlightenment, mathematicians and philosophers developed the discipline of probability. Initially created as a means of understanding chance and randomness in gaming, probability laid the basis for the intellectual revolutions of modern times. In modern times the worldviews of gambler and scientist, punter and philosopher have converged. Meanwhile, the organisation of modern life via markets and speculation has made chance an organising principle of societies.

Yet the assumptions made about the likelihood of winning various legal betting games are unrealistic and misunderstood.

For example, the chance of success in various types of gaming are documented below.

The website is in two main parts. The interactive game is broken down into four sub-games that range in mathematical complexity and cover a broad range of commonplace environments:

• Instant Scratchies (newsagency)
• Lotto (newsagency)
• Pokies (pub/hotel/club)
• Roulette (casino)

The Library is an information repository for more detailed information and teacher tools. Each ‘place’ can be accessed off the graphic ‘main street’.

Playing the games demonstrates how probability works in real-world activities to students in Stages 4 to 5. It is fun to play yet emphasises the likelihood of losing and the financial consequences of long-term play. Consequences are explored in terms of impact on the individual as well as the community. While this project is student focussed we believe it embraces teachers, parents, carers and the local community in its audience reach.

Each sub-game was carefully chosen. For example, poker machines were chosen, as they are perhaps the most controversial gambling medium. Poker machines account for more than 75% of the amounts gambled and lost in New South Wales. In every state where poker machines have been legalised, they have quickly dominated gaming expenditure.

Each sub-game has its own difficulty curve to allow the younger users to start playing and scaffold to the next four levels. It will encourage older and more able students to perform the more advanced mathematics. Each game will have five levels of difficulty. Starting with the most rudimentary of mathematical challenges and mathematics, each round will become more complex and offer deeper insights. The base requirements for each game are that the first round of each game be able to be played by 12 year olds.

Each round will consist of a multiple choice challenge, requiring the user to answer a (randomly generated) multiple choice question with hints and answers provided. The game is interspersed with ‘Did you Knows’ describing a particularly interesting fact about gambling and the game being played, from a cultural or environmental perspective.

Personal stories are found throughout and illustrate the social impacts of gambling. Selected stories will be given in full in the Library section. Read about characters like Lucky whose family sit around the TV watching the Lotto call every Wednesday. Lucky steals money from his parents’ bedroom to support his new found gambling activity; or Yaya and Christina who make a deal to save money instead of spending on Scratchies.

The website is designed for:

• teachers and students in Australian secondary schools (with a special emphasis on NSW curriculums)
• students in colleges and universities studying introductory subjects in statistics, psychology and health studies
• welfare workers and counsellors working in non-government institutions
• agencies supporting the formal education sector such as G Line.

The website was developed with the assistance of experts in the field including Professor John Croucher (Macquarie Graduate School of Management and creator of the popular statistics and gaming course now taught internationally) and Sue Thompson, consultant and author of a number of secondary mathematical publications.

The media and online environment proposed in this project will:

• Provide access to rich sources of information
• Allow an opportunity to manipulate real data
• Encourage meaningful interactions with and across content
• Be dynamic and respond to the players’ efforts
• Bring players together to challenge, support or respond to each other.

The exhibition, website, print publication and associated public programs were given financial assistance by the New South Wales Government from the Casino Community Benefit Fund.

Visit the website at www.powerhousemuseum.com.au/gambling

Helen Whitty is education services coordinator at the Powerhouse Museum.

The author owns the copyright in this article. For information related to the reuse of this work in any form please contact the publisher denise.quinn@curriculum.edu.au

SOLUTION

Report

As we have seen in this article the relationship between the learning aspect and the interest of students. If both of these aspects are being matched in an effective and integrated way then there is a great chance of effective learning. This will also enable us to ensure better aspects of learning and outcomes of our approaches and effectiveness. To make the society more effective and sustainable we need to think out of the box and inquiry approach of learning is like the same ideology. It is a kind of extensive and exploratory learning tool that will have a better outcome and skill development to the learners.

Relate

Inquiry learning is directly related to our life. We all do some kind of inquiry whenever required some help or kind of support while facing any problem related to our study or any other aspect. This approach helps us to get some desired solution of the problem/issue. Sometimes it also suggests most suitable solution of the emerging problems and sometimes it gives us a better approach to the problems which can also be used in future.

Reason

Until and unless we ask question, we won’t be able to get the solution. So the best way of learning to ask question as many as you can. But the question should be relevant and to the point. Like if we are facing some problem in mathematical problem then we should ask about the relevant formulae, diagrams, theorems not the English literature related concerns. There should be a proper and formulated approach to make a better understanding and utility of the learning aspects while using inquiry learning theory to make a better understanding of it practically.

Reconstruct

We all are applying the inquiry theory of learning in our life. In our personal life we use to make inquiry and research while buying any product or availing any services to our neighbours, family members and others. In the same way we also use this theory in our professional life, such as while facing any problem or any unwanted situation we go to our seniors or colleagues to get the desired solution by means of inquiry.

 So we can understand the need and requirement of inquiry theory of learning in our life to make us more effective and sustainable every time.

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