1.1 The role of inquiry in educational contexts
Education is a complex and messy entanglement of people, materials, spaces, policies, practices and theories. We operate in a constantly moving environment, where questions such as ‘why did that not work as I had planned?’, ‘why did the learners not respond as I expected?’, ‘how could I teach that differently next time?’ or ‘why is this group not achieving as they could?’ are a daily feature of our lives.
As professionals committed to doing the best for our learners and improving our own practices, reflection and inquiry are highly valued within our education contexts. This can be seen in the ways in which reflection and inquiry are ‘built in’ to our systems and practices.
Three case studies of inquiry
a. An Early Childhood undergraduate module
As part of a first-year undergraduate module, ‘Exploring perspectives on young children’s lives and learning’, students are asked to complete a number of activities that involve them observing and reflecting on young children’s experiences and talking to practitioners about issues raised in the module. They are asked to identify aspects that they find interesting as the basis of their assignment writing. While these activities aren’t named as such, the emphasis throughout the module is to develop an ‘inquiring approach’, which arises from ideas, images, videos and discussions that catch the attention of the student.
b. Scotland professional learning for teachers
Teachers in Scotland have to meet professional standards of practice set out by the General Teaching Council of Scotland (GTCS). As part of a revised set of standards, practitioner enquiry is embedded throughout the standards, where enquiry ‘involves teachers questioning their own educational beliefs, assumptions, values and practices’ and is achieved through ‘adopting an enquiring stance to challenge and inform their professional practice … to enhance, progress and lead the learning experiences of all their learners, including colleagues and partners’ (GTCS). This focus on practitioner enquiry is reflected in the National Model of Professional Learning, whereby ‘Learning by enquiring’ is considered to be a key feature of high quality professional learning (Education Scotland). Evidence of inquiry forms part of teachers’ professional update processes for GTCS.
c. Higher Education Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL)
Scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) is embedded in the culture of many higher education institutes. For example, at The Open University, each faculty has a dedicated scholarship centre, and staff apply for funding on a bi-annual basis to conduct scholarship activities, often focusing on pressing emergent issues. SoTL is defined as ‘educators moving beyond reflection upon their teaching strategies to an intentional, rigorous and systematic inquiry to investigate teaching practices and pedagogical strategies for student learning and engagement’ (OpenLearn 2021). Time for scholarship is factored into the workload of most academic staff in the university as an important driver for innovation, development and improvement.
While inquiry and reflection are a key part of educational practices, your own reasons for engaging with this course, at this point in your career, will be influenced by a number of factors as you will now explore in Activity 2.
Activity 2 Inquiry expectations in your context
Consider what attracted you to engage with this course. What expectations are there in your context for engaging with inquiry? What do you feel you can gain from engaging with inquiry?
Comment
Your motivation for engaging with this course will be unique to you. Expectations from your context about undertaking inquiry, your own intrinsic interest in exploring an area of practice, and perhaps, formal study which requires you to undertake inquiry, may all play a part in your decision to engage with this course. However, different people and organisations will have different ideas about what inquiry is. Understanding these assumptions or opinions about inquiry is important in navigating your own inquiry processes within your setting, as we will explore in the next section.