Taking the Plunge into Inquiry Based Learning

In preparation for our conference presentation, Jake Gentry, a Geometry teacher at the high school where I work, decided to try an inquiry based learning activity in his classes. We have worked together on a couple project-based learning activities in the past, but we both felt we weren't being "hands-off" enough in letting the students explore the concepts.

To see if inquiry-, discovery-based learning could really work, Jake went all in and had students explore and discover using technology instead of using any direct instruction.

In this recording (around 10 minutes long) I asked him some questions about what he did, what he learned and how effective he thought it was. They're still working through the project, so these are his thoughts so far. I'll let you listen to the recording for the details, but we both feel so far this has been a very enlightening experience. I'm really glad to have been a part of it.

The general outline of the talk is:

• Why we did it
• What the activity was like
• What has he seen so far - is it working?
• The level of thinking that was going on during the activity
• What tech did the students use for learning?
• What tech did he use to run the activity?
• What effects has he seen on the students?
• Was there support from the principal?
• How the focus shifted from "Is this right?" to the learning goals

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I'm doing a challenge this month to post on one of my blogs every day. It's in preparation for my conference session, The Way of the Google Drive. Be sure to follow me on Twitter or on either blog to keep up with the "thoughts and tools to inspire". 

Click here to see all the posts from this blog with the tag The Way of the Google Drive.