Student Driven Questions

How might students be encouraged to inquire about the world around them and follow up on their own questions?

My students are learning the importance of asking questions. We explored what makes up a thick or thin question. We started with their own wonderings as the starting point and asked: "Which questions make you think more? think less?" By comparing the types of questions and answers, students were able to conclude the following:

Thick Questions:

• Hard to answer
• Takes time to think about 
• There may be many answers to the same question and oftentimes there may never even be an answer
• Cannot be answered with just a "yes" or "no"

Thin Questions

• Fast and easy to answer 
• Answers can usually be found quite easily and right away
• There is usually only one answer
• Can usually be answered with a "yes" or "no"

Wonder

Students sorted their questions into thin or thick questions that were connected to our unit or not connected to our unit. Some felt their questions were really thin (Who invented the toilet?) so they placed their Post-its near the top, others felt they weren't so thin, but still thin nonetheless (What makes snow?) so they decided to place it near the middle. Others thought their questions were really thick (Is God real?) so they placed those on the bottom.

Student wonderings included:

• Why do we have time? - Dae Heon
• How does time control the world? - Theresa
• I wonder why time can see everything. - Ben
• How old is the Great Wall of China? - Isabella
• When do turtles die? - Minh Thu & Gabby
• Who invented war? - Dan
• How does the Earth move? - Aqif

Investigate

Students and I collected their research using a website called Blendspace. This allows for personalization and differentiation of resources for each student to investigate their inquiries.

With the iPads, each student can scan their own QR code, which takes them to their own Blendspace of inquiry resources.

Making and Sharing Conclusions

Students then decide when to conclude their investigations and take part in sharing their findings with their classmates. 

This process has allowed my students to pay more attention to their own thinking, while giving them the tools to research what they're wondering and interested in.

Inquiry Through Authentic Maths Problem

Grade 2 students investigated and responded to an open-ended problem one could encounter in 'real' life: ramps. 

This activity gave students the opportunity to use mathematics through the lens of the scientific process. 

Step 1: Question
Students were posed the following questions:

Step 2: Hypothesis

Students gave their best guess:

Hypothesis 1

When the ramp is really high, you use up the speed going down so you don’t travel further, you actually stop. It is kind of like falling from a building.

Hypothesis 2

The higher you get, the more gravity you have, so the faster you can go down the ramp, which means you can go further.

Hypothesis 3

The lower the ramp is, then the speed won't be so fast so you're not going to go as far.

Step 3: Conducted an Experiment

Our mathematical focus was:

• Compare, order, and describe objects by various measurable attributes for length
• Select and use appropriate tools and units to measure length
• Use non-standard units to measure

Students carried out tests with different ramp heights and measured the height of the ramp using centimeter/meter rulers and non-standard units (cubes, hands, blocks, etc.), including the distance the car traveled. 

Some questions that came up during the experiment were:

• Do we measure from the top of the ramp or the end of the ramp?
• When we use the ruler do we start on the zero or the one?
• How can we change the ramp to make the car go faster or further?

Step 4: Analyzed the Results & Made a Conclusion

Students shared their results and most changed their position on the "Yes" and "No" continuum of our original hypothesis. 

Their conclusions were:

• It goes more far when it isn't on carpet.
• The shorter ramps made the car go further. 
• The longer ramps made the car go shorter. I think it's because the car used up all its power to travel on the ramp.
• I chose a heavier car and it made it go further. The light car didn't go as far. 

Constructing Knowledge

This week 2C and 2D have been constructing their own knowledge, the question we kept in mind when planning was 'How can we enable deeper thinking and learning?'.

The students engaged in the following tasks and activities as part of our Unit of Inquiry. Rather than the teacher taking centre stage, students worked together with a partner to inquire and understand the four science topics through these student questions:

• What causes seasons?
• What causes changes in the moon?
• Why do we have day and night?
• Why do we have time zones?

Some skills the students were using were:

• note taking
• reflecting on information on whether it was 'trash' or 'treasure' and could answer the question they were inquiring about.
• group decision making skills
• visual interpretation of information
• analysing digital and print resources and deciding what information to extract

Note-taking Introduction and Practice

Using digital media

Using Print resources

Once students collected and constructed their knowledge in their inquiry journals, they engaged in a marketplace where they shared their knowledge with other students.

Investigating Time Through Seconds and Minutes

In Maths this week we teamed up with another second grade class to investigate the length of seconds and minutes that different activities take. 

We used stopwatches and timers on the Ipad to estimate and then recorded the duration of time. 

Here were some of the things that we first estimated and then timed:

How many times can you....?

• hop in a minute
• throw a basket ball into the hoop in 3 minutes
• run around the basketball court in 2 minutes
• star jumps can you do in 30 seconds

The students then decided on some of their own activities to time using the stopwatches.

This was a fun activity and moving out of the classroom into a different environment for maths was motivating for the students. Working with another class also ensured some new friendships were formed.

The Arrival: A Provocation

Yesterday morning, the Grade 2 students arrived at school and were immediately thrown into a role-play provocation. 

We set the scene by looking at this image (from 'The Arrival' By Shaun Tan) and imagined that we were characters who had just disembarked in a new country.

The Arrival

\We gave the students passports, lined them up and then filed into the 'arrival hall', where the Grade 8 drama students were waiting for us.

The arrival hall was chaotic, the 8th grade guards were speaking a language which the students did not understand so they could understand how it would feel if you didn't speak the host country's language. The students had many forms and medical checks to complete and photos to take. Here are some photos of the provocation:

Can you understand what these forms mean? How did you know how to complete them?

During the provocation these were some of the comments made by the Grade 2 students: 

• I can’t understand their language, but I understand their actions.
• I feel angry because I can’t understand what they’re saying to me and I don’t know where to go or what to do. 
• She wants me to come here again and be tested, but I’ve already done this! 
• We’re lining up but I don’t know why. 
• I’m trying to see where I’m supposed to go, but I don’t understand what their language is. 
• I got this form from over here, but I don’t know if I filled it out right. 
• She told me to sit down quick and then sent me away. 
• There are too many people here. 

After our provocation we reflected in class on what we saw, heard, touched, experienced and thought.

To dig deeper we used a technique called Chalk Talk and CSI (Colour, Symbol and Image), identifying what our strongest emotion, thought and memory was.

I also asked students to identify what they are now wondering about Migration, now that they have experienced a migration process different to theirs. These were their answers:

Students continued the reflection process by blogging their responses to these questions:

• I want you to keep thinking and reflecting, how would you answer these questions? 
• What did you learn about migration today? 
• What do you still want to find out?