Newsletter: So, What is Inquiry?

A week or two ago I received this photo in an email that read "The boys wanted me to send you this picture." I was so excited to get it. Not just because it's a really cool looking cocoon (or is that a chrysalis?) but because the boys knew I'd be interested in seeing what they found. That, to me, is at the heart of what it means to be a school of inquiry - to live in wonder and wander of the world around us and to share in this with the kids. When people ask me what inquiry is I often try to explain it as (1) constantly questioning,  (2) learning how to learn, (3) and critiquing what we are learning. Questions are at the heart of all we do.

Many of our studies are rooted in wonderings that begin "I wonder...", "Why...", "What...", and so on. Because many of the questions come directly from the kids much of what we learn is negotiated. We learn the things the state says we need to know but we also explore the curiosities and interests of the kids.  It's not worksheets or textbook pages or lectures that help kids learn. It's questions, explorations, careful observations, research, discussions, and critique. More often than not, these lead us to a whole new set of questions.

A wonderful part of our mornings is the time in which the kids share their questions with us in our class journals. This structure helps support the kids into a questioning sort of life (in which they are invested in real need-to-know learning) and allows us time to think about all sorts of things we might otherwise never think to address. Here's a sampling of questions and noticings the kids have offered so far this year.


Thers are from our math journal...

I noticed the speed limit signs always have numbers that end in 0 or 5. I wonder why that is? Why not 62 or 73?

I ask my parents to mark my height against the wall every two or three months. I like to mark my height to see how much I have grown. When my Dad measured the marks we noticed a few things. I have grown 5 inches since starting kindergarten. I was 44 inches and now I am 49. Another cool think I am 09 inches taller than my little brother but I am 21 inches shorter than my dad.

I was watching a baseball game. The pitcher threw the ball 95 mph. I wonder how fast the hitter hit it.


These are from our language journal...

Why are some songs popular but other songs aren't popular but people still like them?

Who came up with sign language?


These are from our science journal...

I want to know why frogs are so slimy and I want to know how can frogs stay on the lily pad without sinking and I want to know where frogs come from.

I went to Charleston Museum for Kids. There I saw how electricity is generated. There was a small dam that collected water. When the gates on the dam opened water from the dam flowed down on to a wheel. This made the wheel spin. The spinning wheel caused the lights to go on. How does a light get on by just a wheel spinning?

Why do giraffes have a purple tongue?


And these are from our culture journal...

I wonder why women and girls dye their hair?

On Chinese New Years we eat something called jongji.

When you are teenagers you love to have boyfriends and girlfriends. But when you are kids you can't. Why? Why does that have to be the law?

Why are there bullies? Why can't they all be friends?

And, as you know, this past week we also started questioning the differences between the Halloween costumes offered to boys and girls. Some of the kids in class used this discussion to connect to what they noticed about toys in regards to some being labeled as girl toys and others as boy toys. It made for an interesting discussion. Taking their cue, I found an article about how Target no longer offers its toys or bedding in separate boys and girls sections. One of our 5th graders from last year actually studied this topic while at CFI and had written a letter to share with toy companies and toy makers. She visited our class today to talk about what she learned. Her concern was that the packaging on Nerf was geared toward boys and they were always placed in a toy aisle directed at boys, seeming to ignore the fact girls like to play with them as well (this packaging has since been changed). We discussed how many people in our community feel this sort of thing is problematic while many others see no problem with it at all because the toys and costumes are there to be purchased no matter what gender you are. Personally, I really enjoy exploring the topics that offer such opportunities for people to disagree. This helps us learn how to work through conflict and come to see that it's not such a bad thing at all. In fact, conflict (or disagreement) can help us see the world from the perspectives of others.

And now a few photos from another study this week - our investigation into standard and non-standard units of measurement.