Does Teaching as Inquiry make a difference?

I attended the Inspired Impact symposium earlier this year and contributed to a panel discussion that looked at the question; "Inquiry Learning, does it make a difference?" I decided to take a different slant on the topic and turn the question around.  I began by countering "How will you know unless you inquire into your own practice?"  I then launched into unpacking the Teaching as Inquiry cycle, emphasising the absolute need for evidence to be generated, gathered and understood if we were to know whether or not a difference had been made.  In my experience, too often this is the missing piece from effective teacher practice.

One school I started working with late last year to introduce the Teaching as Inquiry cycle, has now decided to shift from just looking at the data to see what the students can do, to really thinking about what they are doing and their impact on the data.  When last year's data didn't show significant shifts after their year long focus on literacy, they decided to refocus on the effectiveness of their own practice. This year they will be thinking about evidence (of their practice), what it could look like, how they will create opportunities to generate this, how they will share it, analyse it, challenge it and build it to show their own progression.  The staff will effectively be doing an action research project around what is effective pedagogy for their students.  As they are also using the Web as a way of learning this year (note I didn't say they are learning about ICT), the strategies they will be employing to demonstrate their own learning and the evidence they will be able to gather around their students' learning will of course be Web based.  Imagine the doors this will open to them and their students.  Imagine the collaboration they can be involved in, imagine the places those collaborators could come from, and imagine the level of thinking that could therefore engage in their progress.  Powerful stuff.

Now back to the symposium question.  Does Inquiry Learning make a difference?  Most of us are familiar, even comfortable with Inquiry Learning.  If not, this new video from TKI discusses it in a clear way, and highlights the reasons for using this approach today.  It's the difference between knowing and understanding.  Simple.  But incomplete.  Overlay Teaching as Inquiry and the picture is complete.  Also simple! Let me know how you go :)