Greetings!

I have some experience with the "inquiry-based model" for both the educator 
and the learner.  I am happy to share what little I know.

Brief Background
--------------------

Although I am currently an ABE/ESOL educator with the county, my last teaching post was with Portland State 
University's relatively innovative undergraduate program known as University 
Studies.  The program replaces the traditional undergraduate model with 
which most of us are familiar.  The crux of the program is "inquiry-based 
learning," and the "inquiry" approach extends to both students and faculty. 
The original goal was that it would extend to everyone, so that the entire 
learning community of this large urban university would be on the same page 
as far as the format, theory, and parts and pieces that make up 
inquiry-based pedagogy.  

I would be happy to discuss the inquiry-based model of learning as we at PSU
envisioned it for the student in a later message if there is any interest. 
For now, I will address the original topic, which is inquiry-based educator 
development.

First, I think it's necessary to say that faculty in the University Studies 
program taught in teams, and each team had a "theme" that it addressed over 
the course of a year.  Team members teach separate sections of their courses, but try to coordinate thematic materials, readings, and projects.  Every team must teach to four pedagogical goals over the course of a year (critical thinking, ethics, 
language arts, and quantitative literacy); within those goals, we had to 
deliver course content that touched on the traditional university survey 
subject matter such as sociology, history, psychology, science, statistics, 
and writing.  The entire program was learner directed as much as was 
possible.  Also, each faculty member had a student "mentor" -- a upper-division or grad student who worked as a peer mentor with the students in the class during special "mentor sessions," which were held outside regular class time.

I hope this is neither too much nor too little background for me to get to the question at hand, "inquiry-based staff development."  So, here goes:

Overview of Inquiry-Based Model in Practice
--------------------------------------------------

As we at PSU conceived inquiry-based 
learning, at the center is the PORTFOLIO.  Every participant -- each 
student, each faculty member, each mentor, etc. -- ideally has a portfolio. 
The portfolio is, ideally, web based or at least in digital format so that 
it can be shared with ease.  

Beyond the portfolio, the fundamental pieces that I identified of what I came to call 
"portfolio thinking" are GOAL SETTING, ASSESSMENT, REFLECTION, GOAL 
REVISION.  These are also the components of what I understand to be 
inquiry-based learning.

What I would do, as an educator, at the beginning of each phase of a 
learning/teaching experience (we tried not to draw hard lines between 
learning and teaching but rather spoke of the "learning community" and of 
ourselves as participants in this community) was to articulate my GOALS:  what 
did I want to achieve with a certain assignment, activity, project, etc.?  I 
tended to make these goals public (posted on the class website) as part of the assignment, so that 
students would always know WHY I was presenting them with a particular 
learning activity.

So, suppose, for example, that the activity was peer-reviewing of first 
drafts of term papers.  After the first iteration of the activity, I would 
then ASSESS how it went for me.  The greatest challenge, for myself and for 
students, was to keep the assessment about ME, not about them (and, on their 
part, for them to assess themselves, not me).  It seems that our tendency is 
to jump right in to evaluating the other; if there was a problem with the 
assignment, we tend to try to cast "blame" on the other party -- if we are 
educators, we tend to identify where the students dropped the ball; if we 
are students, we tend to point out where the teacher let us down.  In true 
inquiry-based thinking, as I understand it, it is essential that one 
assesses oneself.  What were MY strengths and weaknesses as far as MY PART 
of this assignment (which was to guide the students in the peer-reviewing 
activity)?

The assessment portion leads almost immediately to and overlaps with the 
REFLECTION portion.  For the example at hand, I remember evaluating myself 
and reflecting upon how I set up the assignment, as far as the logistics of 
it went (it was a complete disaster -- which is why this example stands out 
for me).  It didn't work.  Why?  What could I have done differently?  [It's 
important for me to stress that my knee-jerk reaction was to blame the 
students and to list the many ways they "failed" at executing the project --  
but once I remember that I must evaluate MYSELF and leave the students out 
of my assessment, the process becomes far more productive.]  In thinking 
about the many things I could have done differently and how I would change 
the assignment next time around, I eventually came (and this is the 
intention, I think, of inquiry-based thinking) down to the basic question of 
WHY?  What, really, was the purpose, the goal of the assignment?  Is it 
possible that it failed because the educational activity (peer reviewing) 
was poorly or weakly connected to a specific pedagogical goal?  What, 
really, was I trying to achieve?  Could I really identify a specific 
pedagogical goal and, if so, could I really justify this activity (peer 
reviewing) as the best-practices approach?  Certainly, we all "know" that 
peer-reviewing activities are "supposed" to be wonderful and productive, but 
maybe that's a myth -- or maybe the activity didn't fit my class in the way 
it might have elsewhere.  Or maybe I just didn't do a good job.  The key 
here is that in the assessment and reflection process, I, as an educator, 
really delve into the functional theory behind my practice.

In the end, I pronounced the exercise as a failure and admitted that it was 
a mistake.  I shared my analysis not just with my colleagues (my other team 
members), but with my mentor and, perhaps most significantly, with my 
students, who were, after all, the consumers of my work product. 
Simultaneously, as I am assessing and reflecting upon the activity as a 
whole, how I executed it, its rationale, etc., the students are doing the 
same as far as their part in the production of knowledge that is occurring 
in our learning community (this all sounds much more ideal than in practice 
it was, but nevertheless, this is the way many of us genuinely tried to 
conceptualize and execute the process).  Students would write an assessment 
of what they did in terms of actual benchmark standards we faculty had 
developed for each of the four goals (critical thinking, ethics, language 
arts, and quantitative literacy).  They would reflect on what they learned, 
how the experience was for them, and, most importantly, what they would do 
differently.

What is so essential here is that in order for students to become 
self-directed learners, they must learn to take charge of their learning. 
So, the piece about what they would do differently is important.  In the 
early stages, most students are inclined to say that what they would do 
differently would be to "try harder," "take the assignment more seriously," 
"be more responsible about working with their peer," and so on.  But as time 
went on, and with guidance from faculty, the hope is that they would learn 
to say things like, "What I would do differently would be to decide whether 
this assignment really had merit for me as far as my goals as a learner and 
to set up a time with the professor to talk to her about what would actually 
serve my learning needs better."  In theory and in practice, students don't 
really reach this stage until the end of their learning time (e.g., four 
years of undergraduate learning).

The educator should already be at that place, though, ready to critique self 
and system and to identify and articulate changes.  This is why Step 4 
involves SETTING NEW GOALS, that is, both reframing the exercise in terms of 
a new and improved set of goals AND determining in the first place whether 
those original goals even have pedagogical merit.  With my peer-reviewing 
activity, what was I really trying to achieve?  If the pedagogical goal was 
valid, how could I improve the activity so that it worked better OR could I 
achieve the goal with a different activity?

Conclusions
-------------

Challenges:
  a.. time:  smoothly incorporating the four-step process of goal setting, 
  assessment, reflection, and setting new goals -- all of which is done in a 
  portfolio manner, that is, online so that it can be shared with 
  colleagues -- into regular lesson planning activities constitutes yet one more thing 
  the educator needs to do

  b.. owning what's yours:  it's very hard for all parties involved to avoid the 
  temptation to blame the others (the administration, the students, your 
  fellow team members); but it's mandatory to do so, because your inquiry 
  process is about YOU, not about them; your assessment and reflection are 
  around YOUR GOALS, not theirs

  c.. keeping up and staying committed:  one really needs to believe in the 
  process, even if (as was the case for me) this means making it your own, 
  rather than just following the steps laid out by administrators.  In fact, 
  they were rather silent about the process and had minimal requirements.  In 
  order for the inquiry- and portfolio-based model to work, one truly needs to 
  be invested and committed.  This may involve researching the entire process 
  and evaluating it with sound program evaluation techniques

  d.. staff-based buy-in:  related to the above, this really cannot be a top-down (that is, from administrator-to-teaching staff) process.  While the administrators can and should facilitate the process by providing informational retreats, time, and compensation, the details of the process need to be defined, owned, and refined by the actors in the process (in this case, the teaching staff)
Benefits:
  a.. growth:  if done with genuine commitment, one cannot help but learn and grow 
  as an educator (or, if a student, then as a learner); the growth extends 
  beyond growth as an educator to growth as a person.  Personal development 
  becomes very clear and tangible, because you are actually recording it as it 
  happens.  It's all very purposeful.  I still benefit from this mode of thinking on my present job.

  b.. collegiality: One purpose of the inquiry model is to share your portfolio. 
  As your team members read what you have to say, this initiates dialogue and, 
  at least in the case of this team approach, true collegial support.

  c.. portfolio building: ideally, the portfolio portion becomes part of one's 
  promotion and advancement materials and process.  I have come up with a way of including 
  the inquiry-based portfolio thinking into my resume. A prospective employer 
  can read about how I developed a project, assessed it, reflected upon it, 
  and changed it.  Also, the whole thing is supposed to be digital; so, I 
  either have it on the web or on a disk to hand over to someone.

Advice:
  a.. Find a way to be invested and take the approach seriously.  If you don't 
  believe in it, it won't work.  You'll simply resent what you'll see as "extra work" and unsupported "top-down visioning"

  b.. Inquiry-based portfolio thinking is part of the individual-directed learning 
  community approach to pedagogy; therefore, it's important to keep in mind 
  that you are not working in a vacuum, but as part of a teaching team and a 
  larger community -- one that includes your students.  You mustn't be afraid 
  to share with them; they will appreciate and value your honesty and respect 
  you even more

  c.. Be patient; it takes a long time not only to understand what the process is 
  all about but to make it actually work; it's a fundamental shift, so it's 
  not like getting a haircut one day -- waking up with a short bob where you 
  once had waist-long hair.  It's more like waking up after finding out you're 
  pregnant or that you have a life-altering disease or something; it's going 
  to take time and there will be a lot of mistakes along the way. 
As I think back on my experience at PSU with what we called (using current pedagogical buzz terms) "inquiry-based learning," "student-centered [or student-directed] learning," "project-based learning," "portfolios," and "learning community," I realize that while these ideas are widespread, I wonder if more often than not they are just theoretical banners we wave over what we're doing without any real substantive change occurring at the front-line level.  When I doubt the depth of true change, I wonder how much of what is lacking is due to underfunded mandates and dictates coming from administrators on down to the front-line, street-level providers (the teachers).  I think I cannot overstate the importance of staff buy-in and adequate compensation for time invested in development of substitute lesson plans necessary for training sessions, time spent in training sessions, and extra time necessary for implementing new procedures that reflect the updated state-of-the-art vision regarding learning processes.

In this regard, I think it should be mandatory that administrators participate as fully as the teachers in the inquiry-based process of goal setting, SELF EVALUATION, REFLECTION, and setting of new goals, all the while communicating openly with staff about what their own inquiry process has revealed.  Now that would really facilitate a learning community!

I hope some of this is useful.  

Sincerely,

Martha J. Bianco, Ph.D.
ABE/ESOL Educator
Multnomah County Department of Community Justice
Londer Learning Center
Portland, Oregon

 ----------------------------------------------------------------------

> 

> Message: 1

> Date: Tue, 29 May 2007 21:35:46 -0400

> From: "Julie McKinney" <julie_mcKinney at worlded.org>

> Subject: [FocusOnBasics 959] FOB Article-f-the-Week: Inquiry-Based

> Staff Development

> To: <focusonbasics at nifl.gov>

> Message-ID: <465C9CB30200002D0000272F at bostongwia.jsi.com>

> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII

> 

> Hi Everyone,

> 

> In our recent discussion about disseminating research, we talked about

> practitioner research, and it seems there has been a lot of talk lately

> about models of professional development. This week's article is from

> issue 2C and talks about the process of inquiry-based staff development,

> which relates to both.

> 

> Facilitating Inquiry-Based Staff Development:

> While helping teachers to change, staff developers must be open to

> changing, too.

> by Jereann King 

> http://www.ncsall.net/?id=392

> 

> "Inquiry-based staff development is a process in which practitioners

> come together with colleagues over a period of time to systematically

> explore issues, questions, or problems emerging in their work. The

> framework for organizing inquiry-based staff development can differ from

> context to context, but always involves reflecting on practice,

> formulating problem statements, taking new action or trying out new

> approaches, and evaluating their effectiveness. In theory, inquiry-based

> staff development, like learner-centered, participatory adult literacy,

> is about respecting experience, culture, knowledge; it is about sharing

> power and taking new actions. It is a way of learning that places

> practitioners and their practice at the center of the learning process.

> This article is about the tensions and contradictions [the author]

> experienced facilitating a practitioner-inquiry-as-staff-development

> project."

> 

> Has anyone been involved in this kind of staff development?

> What are the challenges?

> What are the benefits?

> What advice do you have for others who are facilitating this?

> 

> I'd love to hear from some of you!

> 

> All the best,

> Julie

> 

> 

> 

> 

> Julie McKinney

> Discussion List Moderator

> World Education/NCSALL

> jmckinney at worlded.org

> 

> 

> 

> ------------------------------

> 

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> End of FocusOnBasics Digest, Vol 20, Issue 26

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