Room 2 Term 4 Inquiry

The initial planned theme was "How do we communicate". I had planned a couple of weeks of teaching and motivating sessions which would involve practical activities, research and problem-solving. I had then thought our wonderings might send us on an exploration about books, publishing, TV programme making, films and radio. We could have visited various places around Palmy and ended up publishing our own book, having our own TV or radio station or making a short film......... but that is not what happened!

All started well then at the wondering stage we had a wide range of questions the majority of which were quite closed and factual. Generally the wonderings were an improvement on previous units.
We looked at:

• What was the first language?
• Why do we speak different languages?
• How do we talk?
• How does a TV work?
• Who invented sign-language?

The children had lots of ideas about where we could look for information (mostly GOOGLE!)

We looked at the origins of sign language and how to say various things. We decided we could use more signs with Pono to help use communicate with her and maybe help her communicate with us...
The crunch came when they want to find the answer to "How does a TV work?" We looked at TVs in particular CRT screens, got a complicated answer we didn't really understand then said "Now what? What are we going to do with this knowledge?" No answers. We had a discussion about what is the use of 'knowing stuff'" if you don't need it!!!
The children decided they would like to know more about being blind and deaf and they would then like to do something to help blind and deaf people.

We used the internet to find more information and played more games.

Finally, we got ready for our EXPO to parents:

• We designed games to make people more aware of what it would be like to be blind, partially sighted, partially deaf and completely deaf.
  
• We designed and made posters and leaflets to inform people.
  
• We tested and made milkshakes which we sold at school.
• We made a book with an illustrated story "How Pukeko Turned Blue" that we wrote in literacy including animated movies, fact sheets, comicbooks and quizzes.
• We made Xmas cards to sell
• We made bookmarks to sell

Was our inquiry a success?

• Yes, all the children had a better understanding of the inquiry process and the purpose of inquiry.
• Yes, all the children had a better understanding of the potential risks that could cause blindness and deafness.
• Yes, there was a definite purpose to our writing and publishing which resulted in a higher standard of work.
• Yes, we raised over $100 for guide dogs for the blind.
• NO! Very few parents turned up to the EXPO but we did play the games with the rest of the school.
  

End of Year Celebration

We have had our end of year round-up where a few schools shared the 'Inquiry Journey NO! Adventure' so far. What came out of this?

• The cluster schools have obviously been working hard.
• The schools are developing their own 'vision' of their local curriculum and how inquiry will fit into this.
  
• All the school seem to be at different stages of the process depending on their infra-structure and the openness of their staff.
• It showed that we are all reflective practitioners who as Michael Pohl stated "...are too often too critical of ourselves but are actually doing a good job..!"

Issues directly applicable to Opiki school?

• We have made great progress and should be proud of our achievements...
• Other schools are also contemplating the depth and coverage issues.
• Quality higher order thinking and questioning is hard!
  
• Neil said "...the process should be visually evident and graphically presented to aid pupil understanding, inclusion and relevance.
• Reduce the number of stages but increase the steps within stages (more detail)
• Exemplars of the different stages
• Linked to the school vision and new local curriculum.
• Assessment of inquiry! Skills, process, knowledge, key competencies???

All in all, an interesting day. Finally a huge thank you to Jan Thomas for her hard work this year.