2013+Sabbatical+Report-+Inquiry+Learning

Inquiry Learning - Way of doing or way of being? = =  Examining inquiry learning and the dispositions of effective of inquiry learning teachers Richard Jones Deputy Principal Onerahi Primary School, Whangarei, New Zealand December 2013

In November 2007 following a lengthy period of trial and consultation, the New Zealand Ministry of Education launched the revised New Zealand Curriculum (NZC). Schools were required to give full effect to this document by 2010. In doing so, schools were challenged to review their curriculum delivery aligning them to better reflect the needs of their community; and the vision and principles that underpin the NZC.

// ‘Curriculum is designed and interpreted in a three-stage process: as the national curriculum, the school curriculum, and the classroom curriculum. The national curriculum provides the framework and common direction for schools, regardless of type, size, or location. It gives schools the scope, flexibility, and authority they need to design and shape their curriculum so that teaching and learning is meaningful and beneficial to their particular communities of students. In turn, the design of each school’s curriculum should allow teachers the scope to make interpretations in response to the particular needs, interests, and talents of individuals and groups of students in their classes.’ (Ministry of Education, 2007, p. 37). //  Attempts to align the delivery of local curriculum with the NZC vision of developing young people who are “creative, energetic, and enterprising, confident, connected, actively involved, lifelong learners” (Ministry of Education, 2007, p. 8) has seen many primary schools either adopting generic models of inquiry learning or developing their own inquiry processes based on a hybrid of approaches which they think best reflects the needs of their ‘local communities’. Onerahi Primary School has been one school that has continued to work towards strengthening its understanding and delivery of inquiry learning. The main focus being: to raise achievement and strive towards growing ‘thoughtful, creative, inspired learners’. Inquiry learning is viewed by many as a strong catalyst for developing the vision and principles as outlined in the NZC and is used as a pedagogical approach in many New Zealand schools. While the curriculum does not specifically endorse inquiry based learning, its vision does challenge schools to provide learning experiences that will enable students to learn how to be “critical and creative thinkers; active seekers, users and creators of knowledge” (Ministry of Education, 2007, P.8) thus aligning the curriculum with many 21st century learning ideas. As a school leader, and with my own experiences of trying to construct meaningful and worthwhile approaches to delivering an integrated inquiry based curriculum, I continue to question; 1. the degree to which teachers understand the principles that underpin inquiry learning, 2. how those principles are truly reflected in their practice, 3. how our school approach compares to approaches used in other schools, 4. how well our school approach is aligned to the vision and principles of the New Zealand Curriculum.

The **key purpose** of my sabbatical has been to: 1. Investigate understandings of inquiry learning and how these might transfer from theory into classroom practice; 2. Investigate a range of curriculum designs and enquire how these might take students beyond surface learning. The aim has not been to find, adopt or adapt a model of inquiry, but to enquire into the pedagogical beliefs of school leaders, investigate the dispositions of ‘skilled’ inquiry learning teachers, and research the principles that underpin effective inquiry pedagogy//.//

A copy of this report can be downloaded here