INQUIRY CURRICULUM AND STANDARDS:A CONVERSATION WITH KATHY SHORT
By Yvonne Siu-RunyanPublished in 'The Colorado Communicator': February 1999
Many educators are thinking of curricular issues. Especially they are thinking about what should be in the curriculum, what should the standards be and how to assess or evaluate what students learn? So my first question is broad but one that needs to beaddressed. I’m interested in what you think the ‘curriculum ‘is.
Curriculum is Putting Beliefs into Practice – a Challenge forEducators
Curriculum to me is putting beliefs into practice. And so curriculum isthe bridge between the specific engagements in our classroom andour set of beliefs. All of us operate on beliefs even if we can’t statethem. We’ve all got practices that we have collected here and there:some of them we have developed ourselves. The issue with regardsto the curriculum is how those beliefs become some kind of coherentprogramme in the classroom. Curriculum is the organisationalstructure, the framework that allows us to put our beliefs into practisein the classroom. The most common kind of curriculum is based on scope and sequencecharts and is very hierarchical. A lot of people have tried to moveaway from that but what they have tended to move into are grabinquiry. Exploration of the materials and carefully chosen teachersdemonstrations and read-alouds then build student backgroundknowledge – students explore and dialogue about the area in order toexplore what might be interesting to ask and study. The questionsemerge from the initial exploration and immersion into the topic.In a theme unit, the focus is on what to teach about the topic.In inquiry the focus is on exploring the topic from as manyperspectives as possible before finding questions or issues for in-depth investigation.I am concerned that too frequently research is simply a collection of isolated facts. I think we went from a text book approach where kidsmemorized isolated facts to a unit approach where kids havecollected isolated facts. And where did we really get? Just acompendium of isolated facts with little understanding of concepts of the ‘big picture’.Students may have been studying something that was moreinteresting to them but this study did not really change the nature of what they were learning. When truly doing inquiry during explorationtime students gather a lot of facts which lead them into askingimportant questions. They don’t just collect facts but use them to askbigger questions and to construct broader understandings.
Yes, and seeing bigger connections as well. How does literacy fit all of that?
I think that literacy is one of the tools for constructing onesunderstanding of the world, others and ourselves. When I think aboutliteracy I am not just talking about reading and writing. Instead Iinclude art, movement, mathematics, drama and so on. These are alltools that kids need in order to find out about the topic. Besides usingthese broadly defined literacies to inquire, they are also using them tocommunicate and to record for themselves as well as to put togethera presentation to share what they have learned with others.One of the things that I think has been a problem is that oftenliteracies have been thought about as merely a way to communicatewhat one has learned to somebody else. I’m saying that all theliteracies are used in doing research in order to learn.What I mean by that is that if kids are researching the topic they arenot just reading books. They are talking to people, they are looking atart, they are listening to music, they are looking at dramaperformances or plays or dances that relate to the topic. They arealso sketching as a way to record. They are doing all of that as part of their research process. Then they are also using these tools as theycommunicate.So in doing inquiry, all the processes and tools for learning andcommunicating are woven throughout the study. This is important because knowledge systems or the disciplines areused by learners in different ways when doing inquiry. Literacy toolsbroadly defined are for making and sharing meaning. The knowledgesystems such as science, history psychology and so on are stancesthat learners can take on from the various disciplines which allowsthem to ask different questions and see things from theseperspectives about the topic they are exploring.For example, if I were a historian I would ask a different questionabout a particular topic that if I’m looking at it from the perspective of business, philosophy, science and so on. Looking at a topic of studyfrom different perspectives allows students to think and explore indifferent ways. They ask different questions and use different research tools andtechniques.
Now, to approach learning with inquiry requires teachers to be able to let go and trust and encourage and to take on a different kind of role in that classroom setting. Is that true?
Doing Inquiry Means Taking a Different Stance as a Teacher.
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Yes, that is true. When I did theme units as a classroom teacher Iused to find all the activities, all the books, all the resources and thequestions. Everything came from me and after a while that becamereally old.It was a problem for me as it is for many teachers today.No wonder teachers ended up wanting to box those units and usethem over and over again each year – it is so exhausting to do them. The other major problem with this approach is that the children arelimited by what the teacher knows. This means that the childrencan’t go any further than the teacher’s knowledge.Now in doing inquiry teachers are sharing the responsibility of learning with the students. It’s not that the kids construct knowledgecompletely by themselves; it’s not that the teacher doesn’t have arole. Teachers are there pushing all the time and bringing in perspectivesthat students are not considering. Learning this way becomes ashared responsibility and the students are never limited by what theteacher knows.When doing inquiry in this way, teachers have a very important role interms of setting up structures that support inquiry. It is not laissez-faire. It’s not just turning kids loose and telling them to do whateverthey want to do. If we really want to work with inquiry teachers needto have some very careful structures in place to support kids in goingabout inquiry. Also teachers offer perspectives that kids aren’tconsidering. That is teachers need to find out what the students’ perspectives areas they are inquiring and consider what they aren’t posing and bringthose ideas forward. It’s not that teachers are trying to force kids totake on a certain perspective but rather to be aware of thoseperspectives and out of conscious consideration of their students,construct a broader and bigger understanding. This kind of curriculum takes a lot of thinking and work on the part of theteachers.
Now doesn’t this also mean that teachers also really need to be aware of what the kidsare doing and what might they need assistance with?
Kid-Watching and Continuous Evaluation - NecessaryComponents in Inquiry
Right. It involves a great deal of kid watching and continuousevaluation. Not just testing. In fact, what I would argue is thatinquiry does not start with teaching kids something. An inquiry startsby setting up engagements that allow kids to story about theirexperiences related to that topic. Teachers need to create as many3
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Inquiry Curriculum and Standards: A Conversation With Kathy Short
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