When I googled “Inquiry based learning” one of the very first hits to appear is the link to the website described below. They describe Inquiry-based learning as a learning process through questions generated from the interests, curiosities, and perspectives/experiences of the learner. When investigations grow from our own questions, curiosities, and experiences, learning is an organic and motivating process that is intrinsically enjoyable.
I am very happy with the way they explain it in their diagram:
What a great way to learn right? Being able to ask the questions that you want to know, create your own personal hypothesis of those questions, investigate them, find some new knowledge that you have gained from it, discuss with others on what you found, and then apply it in real life? What an extremely attractive way to learn!
Connected Mathematics Project (CMP)
When visiting the Connected Mathematics Project Homepage their overarching goal is that “All students should be able to reason and communicate proficiently in mathematics. They should have knowledge of and skill in the use of the vocabulary, forms of representation, materials, tools, techniques, and intellectual methods of the discipline of mathematics, including the ability to define and solve problems with reason, insight, inventiveness and proficiency.”
Sounds like a pretty awesome goal to me, so how are we going to get there?
The CMP instructional model follows the design of “Launch, Explore, and Summarize”. The basic idea is that the teacher launches a discussion and helps the students understand the nature of the question. The next stage is to explore the questions you might have about the topic individually, in pairs, or even in larger groups. Finally, once these groups have had sufficient time to discuss, all of the parts of the classroom come back to a whole to summarize what they have found.
The question is : “How does the CMP Instructional Model (Launch -> Explore -> Summarize) compare to the more traditional direct instruction -> guided practice -> independent work model? Is the CMP model inquiry based?”
Through the research that we have all put together the CMP model definitely seems to be an inquiry based method that completely differs from the direction instruction method and allows students to learn the topics in a much more dynamic fashion while really challenging them to think rather than posing the questions for them. Id say that this would be a pretty powerful way to teach math if you set it all up correctly!
When prompted with the following questions, Loran Sell, a former middle school math instructor and now professor described his thoughts on the CMP:
- How does the CMP curriculum align with the national Common Core and NCTM standards? Very well, in fact it was designed to fit the standards.
- Numerous students are a year or more behind in the basics. How does one address the needs of these students on a daily basis so they can get up to grade level and also experience success in the inquiry to investigation philosophy of the CMP? This is a difficult problem that, in my experience, is not addressed adequately in CMP. What I see most teachers doing is filling in the basics with drill and practice. Without devoting extra time to reteaching basics, students who are lacking in skills are either retaught at the cost of the CMP objective, or continue to flounder and often become dependent on other members of their group.
- What is the role of homework (and accountability) in the CMP? Teachers who are training in CMP and make the most of the class time may not need homework to accomplish the objectives. Unfortunately there are far too many teachers teaching CMP who are not trained and/or do not buy into this style of teaching. For homework to be effective, it most have a meaningful connection to the lesson that enriches or reinforces the lesson. What I see is often homework is " finish the assignment."
- CMP Investigations compose of small-groups (pair-share, teamwork, cooperative learning).
- Describe several classroom management techniques that ensure all students are actively engaged. Eg, how are individual roles established? Accountability (Group, individual)? Ongoing assessment(s) and checking for understanding? For small group work to be effective it most have both group and individual accountability. This is where the training of teachers is vital. Without it many teachers forget one or the other. Individual scores have both a group and individual component. ie
- a. Your grade on today's activity will be 50% on the work and answer that your group obtains, and 50% on your explanation of the process used to arrive at this answer.
- b. EAch group member has an individual responsibility in the final product. - Tom will show the mathematical solution of the problem - Amy will write an explanation of the process that the group used to solve the problem - Alice will show the check of the solution using an alternate method. - Shawn will flowchart the process
WONDERFUL illustration of inquiry based learning. OK --- all looks good in THEORY.
ReplyDeleteQuestion to consider: Since the success of this curriculum depends on the upper level of Blooms Taxonomy, how does one address those kids who have low lever or virtually no 'basic skills' to build upon? How can they work in groups to read, compare, contrast, discover ... when they don't have a grasp on basic math skills?
It will be interesting to see how this pans out when asking these essential questions during your MS Math Interview.