What lies beneath? Personal values and inquiry learning

I recently had the pleasure of teaming up with two of my inquiry-pals, Trevor Mackenzie and Kimberly Mitchell for a ‘fireside chat,’ hosted by Toddle. As always, the conversation with stimulating and affirming and, hopefully, helpful for the audience who had posed some fascinating questions for us to discuss.  At one point in the conversation, Trevor explained the way he anchors his practice in his five personal values. It was one of those moments that gave me unexpected pause to ponder … ‘hang on, when did I last do a ‘values check’ on myself?’ 

We talk a lot about the importance of schools articulating their values and how these values help form principles that underpin actions, but it has been a while since I had stopped to think carefully about my ownvalues as an educator. If I had to identify the five that anchor me as an educator, what would they be? And have they changed over the years? And what difference would it make if I was more explicit and transparent about those values when working with teachers? And, most importantly, do my actions when working with teachers and kids reflect those values? 

I found it really stimulating to ponder these questions over the weekend and thought I would take a moment to share the five I finally settled on.  These values guide me as an educator with an inquiry stance. They guide me but I know I don’t always successfully honour them when I should, nevertheless, naming them might help that strengthen my actions. I am thinking about my values being like the roots of a tree: anchoring me, growing over time, nurturing me and intertwined with each other. 

Curiosity 

This will come as no surprise given my passion for inquiry, but I really DO think I hold this value deeply in my life, both in and out of education. Valuing curiosity helps keep my mind open to possibilities. It helps me approach interactions with questions, it promotes a healthy (I think) scepticism and encourages me to keep learning and stay humble. If I truly value curiosity, I welcome learners’ questions and I remain intrigued by their ways of seeing the world. If I value curiosity, I design learning experiences to cultivate that curiosity in others. If I value curiosity, I remain curious about myself as a learner and a teacher, hopefully always open to discovering new ideas and ways of thinking and being prepared to shed what no longer serves me and my colleagues well.

Connection (with the natural world and with people)

This is a big one, and one I think many educators share. For an inquiry-based educator, it is our willingness to build strong connections with learners and to each other that fuels our practice. Inquiry does not work well in an environment where people feel they need to keep arm’s length from others, rather it is unashamedly dependent on strong, authentic relationships that deepen over time. In order to sustain these human connections, I need to ensure they are authentic and they are nurtured. Ironically, having thousands of on-line connections can reduce the quality of those connections nearest and dearest to us or even give us a false sense of ‘being connected’. I think I have been made very aware of how strongly I value connection on returning to onsite work with staff and kids and experiencing, once again, the way true connection fuels our teaching souls! 

My connection to nature is where I find personal renewal and purpose.  This is an easy value to talk about but a more challenging one to truly live in practice. If I value connection to nature, I need to honour that connection in my everyday life, in my teaching, in decisions I make as a consumer and in where I choose to spend my time.  What I do know is that without re-connecting with the natural world on a regular basis,  I feel depleted.  This is one value I am trying to consciously strengthen in my conversations with teachers, the resources I share and my work with children. Talk that needs more walk! 

 Integrity

The older I get, the more significant this value is to me. I wonder if it would have made the top five list in my early career? I doubt it. There are so many threads woven into the concept of integrity, but I think the rise and rise of social media in education has a lot to do with the need for this value in my life. More then ever before, material is being produced, shared and sold without acknowledgemen or substantial research. The internet is awash with shiny, shallow offerings produced for (and by) teachers that look tantalizingly engaging but lack little substance or credibility.  I think this value helps me to be discerning and maintain a focus on quality wherever possible.    In many ways, valuing integrity helps me honour the other values. Am I truly living these out or simply talking and writing about them?  To value integrity requires courage. It means calling our injustice when you see it, it means asking hard questions around the planning table even when it feels uncomfortable, it means staying ‘above the line’ and resisting the temptation to compromise your beliefs for the sake of a smoother or easier process. I feel it when I fall below the line – we all do – but the more conscious I am of where that line is for me, the better teacher I can be. 

Depth

I struggled to find the right word for this one. But it really is a guiding value. When I am working with teachers and with children, my aim is always to get beyond the surface and to find time to dig more deeply into whatever we are thinking about. Over the years, I have come to understand more fully, the power of space, time and silence to nurture reflection and to remind myself to look, listen and think more closely and more deeply into whatever I am exploring. Give me a substantive conversation over a worksheet any day and loosen me from the shackles of ‘covering’ rather than uncovering. I have come to value the inevitable complexities that emerge when an idea is given time and space to reveal itself to a group. Rather than be alarmed by confusion, tension or uncertainty, I think experience can help us lean it to the fog, and stay with it knowing the view will be all the more clear and profound when it lifts.  When I am in the presence of educators unafraid to go deep, I know it brings out the best in my own thinking and helps me encourage young learners to deepen their thinking in the classroom. 

Creativity

I think this core value is one of the reasons I was attracted to teaching in the first place! I adore the creativity of being an educator!  It was this value that I also think drew me to inquiry all those years ago.  There is nothing more compelling, for me, than working with teachers and children to design experiences for learning and to witness the amazing range of ways that learning can be expressed. Because I value creativity, I need to design experiences that allow learners to communicate in a myriad of ways. Because I value creativity, I need to stay open to different ways of seeing. Because I value creativity, I need to ask questions that nurture it in others .. What if? How might? How could?  Because I value creativity, I am disinclined to use scripted materials, programs, pre-planned units or any ‘cookie-cutter’ activities.  Teachers are amazingly creative people and deserve the freedom to design for learning in response to what they see and hear in their students. Creativity brings ‘alive-ness’ to teaching. Creativity brings joy. 

So, there they are. At least there they are right now:  curiosity, connection, integrity, depth and creativity.  They are the amongst values that brought me to inquiry learning and the values that underpin the ways I approach it.  Of course, like any of these kinds of lists, it is impossible to really ascertain what your ‘top’ are – I may re-read this tomorrow and think that the other contenders (authenticity, humility, playfulness, beauty, agency…) should have made it onto the top 5, but the exercise alone is such a useful one. 

 I am so grateful to Trevor for his prompt and hope that by sharing these thoughts with you, I may prompt a similar reflection.  Exploring our personal values and sharing them with colleagues seem to me to be paramount to effective professional learning.  As has been said by many, one of the reasons behind failures for ‘innovation’ to be sustained in classrooms is when the personal values of the educator is in conflict with the spirit or intention of the innovation. If you strongly value ‘compliance’, for example, (a valid value particularly in some cultures) then approaches that are all about nurturing agency will be harder to implement.  

So, what are your top five?  Do they successfully guide your practice? How do we manage ourselves when our core values conflict with the school’s values?  When was the last time you did a personal values ‘check in’?  What might others assume you value from the way you teach and interact with children, colleagues and parents? Have your values as an educator changed over time? 

 Just wondering … 

the sweet spot between safety and adventure - and how picture books can help you find it.

‘But Rogers knew that without familiarity – and, by extension, the trust that familiarity fosters, children’s curiosity can wither. It sounds counterintuitive, but children’s sense of adventurousness is paradoxically tied to their sense of safety. Kids need both to feel confident enough to explore the world around them.’ (Behr and Rydzewski, 2021:29)

One of the persistent myths about inquiry-based classrooms is that they are chaotic, and unstable environments where anything goes. A commitment to listening to children and planning in responsive ways suggests to some a lack of routine, order, or predictability. I am currently reading Behr and Rydzewski’s delightful book: “When you Wonder, you’re Learning” which draws on the beautiful work of Fred Rogers (a mainstay of children’s television in America from 1968 – 2001) and offers important lessons and reminders for today’s parents and educators. (I highly recommend it and have Linda Kaser and Judy Halbert to thank for recommending it to me!)  Not only did the television show itself become a reliable, routine aspect of so many children’s lives – something to look forward to each day/week – the format of the show was similarly predictable. But within the show, were countless moments designed to spark wonder, to invite the young learner to venture into the unknown, to ask questions, to make connections, and to explore.   For me, this mirrors the ‘sweet spot’ in the inquiry classroom. In order to effectively move with the unexpected moment, to be open to the question you do not know is coming, to be responsive and agile and take risks – we need a secure home base. We need rhythm and routine – boundaries that allow us to experiment in safety. Inquiry classrooms can and should be calmly energetic, a safe space in which learners are relaxed AND alert and where predictability and routine help support the spontaneity and adventure. 

Here in Australia, we are beginning the school year. More than ever before, as children in many states return to the learning on site after months of lockdown last year, we are acutely aware of the need to nurture relationships, establish routines and create a space that helps kids feel confident enough to explore. These first few weeks are vital in creating a learning culture – a culture which can either enhance or diminish children’s willingness to explore, take risks, make mistakes, reflect, collaborate and so on. 

Of all the routines I value as a primary school teacher, there is none more precious than gathering as a class to share in a really good book. When I taught full time, this was a sacred time – usually straight after lunch EVERY day and one of my great joys was in choosing what to read. Oh the anticipation of the book!  The conversations we had! As readers of this blog and my newsletter will know, I am a devotee of high-quality children’s literature - real books written by real authors and of the simple, powerful joy of reading to and with children. So if you are going to create any kind of routine in your classroom this year – make sure reading to your children is one of them. Do it every day.  The routine has the added bonus of connecting the group through the invisible thread of the shared experience of listening to and connecting with a powerful story. Serial reading is so important but reading a full picture book, start to finish, is a unique experience. 

 Last year, I shared a post about the way Oliver Jeffers’ book “What we’ll Build” could be used to create a class learning agreement.  This year, I am casting my net a little wider and sharing a few more of my favourite books (so hard to choose! So many!)  to use early in the year together with a few questions or prompts that might be helpful in shaping dialogue about shared expectations, goals and roles, ways of relating, agreements, etc. 

All the Ways to be Smart by Davina Bell and Allison Colpoys

What is smart? What does it mean to be smart? What kind of smart do you think you are? What makes you say that? Can you get smarter? Are we born smart, or do we become that way? This book is such a lovely way to open up the idea that being ‘smart’ can take all sorts of forms. The examples are numerous, and the rhythm and rhyme of the text is beautiful. I would begin by asking children to share their ideas about ‘smart’ before reading and then reflect on new thinking at the end possibly inviting them to write a letter sharing their view of their own strengths as learners.  Great one for parents too! 

The Name Jar by Yangsook Choi 

This is an old favourite and one of many books I own about names and identity.  This is a really lovely way to introduce an inquiry into the story of our names. It is often surprising what kids don’t know about their names and fantastic way to build intercultural understanding as well as honouring identity. After reading invite children to share what they DO know about their names and brainstorm some questions together that they can go home and ask to find out more. Have them teach tell the story of their names through the week.

My Heart by Corinna Luyken

This really is a most beautiful book. Simply reading it to your kids and inviting their reflections and connections may be enough.  A gentle way into conversations about the degree to which we can manage or control our emotions and responses to experiences. The last line: ‘Closed, or open – I get to decide’ is the kicker! What a wonderfully provocative statement. Do we get to decide? How much control DO we have over ourselves?  This book is also a lovely way to introduce the idea of a heart map – where children write or draw, in the shape of a heart, their interests and passions so you can get to know them better. 

The Most Magnificent Thing by Ashley Spires

Another perennial favourite, I come back to this book again and again as a way into conversations about managing expectations, making mistakes and coping with disappointments.  This is the perfect book to include early in the year when we should be having open conversations about the nature of learning and the value of mistake making. 

The Tree in Me by Corinna Luyken

Another Luyken book - I am a big fan!  This is a book about connection, and I just adore it. Even the title ‘The Tree in Me’ is enough to spark wonderful speculation: What might this mean? Can you really have a tree inside you? Why this title?  On reading the book, I encourage children to think not only about their connection with nature but also about what feels so special, so connected to them that it almost feels ‘inside’ them.  I would love to share this book while seated beneath a tree – have children spend time really feeling and exploring that connection with nature and ask: how might we keep connected to the earth as we learn together this year? How might we stay connected to each other? 

 My teacher is a Monster by Peter Brown 

We talk a lot about the “image of the child” in inquiry circles – and equally important is the image of the teacher held by children (and parents) and indeed by ourselves! This story is about perspective – the way we see each other and the judgements we make and how shared experiences and a willingness to see each other in new ways can redefine our relationships. Early in the year, we should be explicit and transparent about roles and invite children to share their thinking about what they think a good teacher says/does/feels/thinks? Always fascinating and a great way into inquiring into learning. 

 How to Heal a Broken Wing by Bob Graham

 It is almost impossible to choose which Bob Graham book to feature – I want to share them ALL. I am not even sure why this one comes to mind as a good early-in-the-year book. All I know is that when I read this book to a group of children a reverent hush always descends on the group. It is a story about noticing, empathy, kindness and being a good citizen in the most unassuming of ways. I think it can lead to gentle conversations about looking out for one another, about taking time to support and help others about how kindness can find a home in your classroom. 

 Wonder Walkers by Micha Archer 

My collection of books about wonder grows every year. This one is a great way to invite children to share the things that THEY are curious about. After reading it, ask them to share their own wonderings. – “what would you like to explore this year?”  The best way to use this book is as an invitation to conduct your OWN wonder walk. Even if the kids are really familiar with school – try a wonder walk where they deliberately approach the buildings and grounds with curiosity. Can we notice things we have not noticed before? 

Nine things to Remember (and one to forget) by Alison Binks

 A beautiful book to read aloud. I like the idea of innovating on this text and asking children what they think THEY should remember about being a learner? If you…remember to …. Another way to use the text is as a stimulus for them to imagine themselves at the end of the year. What memories would they like to have? 

What do you do with a problem? By Kobi Yamada 

All Yamada’s books are fabulous for the beginning of the year but this one is especially good for igniting a conversation around behaviour and generating ideas to form a class agreement. Most children are well aware of some of the typical issues/problems that come up in a classroom. Discussing what they are, why they occur and what the response might be can help build collective ownership of the norms and expectations in your learning community 

 Going Places by Peter Reynolds

 Like Bob Graham, Oliver Jeffers and Kobi Yamada, I could choose ANY one of Peter Reynolds books to use in the process of building a community early in the year. Going Places is an ideal text to introduce the idea of being imaginative, creative, and unafraid to ‘do it your way’. This is a book to prompt innovative, agentic thinking. It is also a beautiful way to explore the power of collaboration and what can happen when we put our heads together.  You might follow this book with a rich, open-ended task and encourage your children to do it THEIR way, to celebrate thinking outside the box and be less concerned about what others are doing. 

The Wonder of Winsome by Kath Murdoch

I just can’t leave her out!!   I wrote this book with the beginning of the year in mind (especially the prep/kinder year).  I would encourage you to share it at a parent night – a reminder to parents that adults have such incredible power when it comes to curiosity and agency. How would I use it in the classroom? I’d set up some wonder boxes or wonder journals (one for me too) and invite children to add to these whenever they have a wonder. Another routine can be the weekly sharing of wonders and selecting one to explore together. 

Oh my goodness! This has been such a LONG post and yet I finish it feeling dissatisfied. Why? Because there are SO many more! (You should see the pile I began with… )I would love to hear about your favourite books to use early in the year as you collaboratively create your learning community with your children.  Please do share!  And I also encourage you to consider the kinds of routines and rituals that you will introduce into your classroom this year to help create the calm, secure space we need for adventurous learning.

What routines do you like to establish? 

What are your favourite books to use early in the year?

Do you read to your children every day? Do you have a ritual associated with it? 

 Just wondering …

Environmental Education: re-kindling and re-imagining.

I recently had the pleasure of listening to an episode of ‘Recess Duty’ – a new podcast from Levi Allison (you can listen to the episode here.) His guest was Kevin O’Shae who has a passion for Environmental Education. It was a great conversation, and a timely one. I listened to it while the Glasgow Climate Change conference was winding up, the reports from which left me feeling that all too familiar sense of disappointment, frustration and fear. I listened to it as I walked beside my local Merri Creek, a place that became such a source of calm and beauty during Melbourne’s endless lockdown.  Here I was, immersed IN the natural environment, listening to someone talking ABOUT it and worrying that it was all too little, too late to do anything FOR it.  

 In, about, for

This mantra was such a big part of my life in the 80’s and early 90’s when I was so actively involved in the environmental education movement here in Victoria. I was an enthusiastic member of the national and state associations, went to conferences, ran weekend workshops – I even wrote books about it “Springboards to Environmental Education” and  “Integrating Naturally” and helped launch a beautiful Environmental Education Theatre Company – Vox Bandicoot, into schools. I introduced Environmental Education as an elective in the then diploma of primary teaching course at the University of Melbourne and sitting rather forlornly on a shelf in my study is a dusty, framed certificate with my name on it “Environmental Educator of the Year.”  

 So it was with a strange sense of shame that I listened to this podcast. The environmental education movement has been with us for decades. Why am I not as active in the field as I once was? Why have I let it slip? Why am I not using every opportunity I can to bring this work to teachers?  

 And, more profoundly, why have we not made more progress?  

These days, the concept of sustainability is widely explored and often used as a driving concept for inquiries. Generally speaking, however, the inquiries that link to this concept focus on things like recycling, deforestation, climate….all vitally important issues but simply learning ABOUT these things is insufficient.  In this post, I want to revisit the essence of a simple framework and share two additional elements I have been pondering.  I hope this might form the basis of a conversation with your team about your inclusion of environmental education in your work. And I hope it will help me strengthen my own efforts to do the same.

 When thinking about the environment in education, consider teaching and learning in, about, for, through and from …. 

IN the environment

 Many of us have discovered the joy being and indeed of teaching outdoors as a result of COVID.  There is little point in learning about the environment if you are not going to spend time in it. That is where the emotional connection happens. That is where the caring grows. Forest kindergartens and nature play do appear to be having a renaissance, but we all need to commit to giving learners time to simply be IN nature with no other agenda than the feeling of connection and joy that brings.  Get out there!! 

ABOUT the environment

The big issues matter. And our kids want and deserve to know about them. But sitting beneath those issues are some critical concepts that help us all understand them better. Decades ago, the Earth Education Institute recommended these simple concepts as critical to our understanding:  energy, cycles, diversity ,change, interrelationships, connection and adaptation.  A concept-based approach to inquiring into the environment helps build a more robust understanding of the issues at stake.  And parallel to this big picture thinking, let’s not neglect the importance of knowledge building. Here in Australia, the work of the Gould League founded by the wonderful Alan Reid played a pivotal role in the education of so many young people by helping them learn about the plants and animals of their local area. Some of my very, VERY best teaching moments have been in the context of a school yard bird study, ponding, locating and learning about the insects in the school garden. Nature offers us such powerful provocations for inquiry if only we stop to notice.  I still have (and use!) my invertebrate identification cards and many other amazing resources from that time. Get to know your local animal and plant species. Learn their names and their role in the habitats around you. Knowledge is power.

FOR the environment

Ultimately, change happens not because of what we learn but because of what we dowith what we learn. Inquiry approaches have always championed action and environmental education depends on it.  Learning IN and ABOUT the environment motivates us to want to protect and care for it.  Working with schools like Howrah Primary school in Tasmania has reminded me of the empowering experience taking action brings to children. Throughout the year the children have been actively involved in taking action for a range of local, threatened species. You can read about it on their facebook page.  Find out about the local environmental projects and issues you can get your kids involved in.   

THROUGH the environment

By situating journeys of inquiry in the context of the natural world, the door to a meaningfully integrated curriculum opens wide. A group of teachers shared with me recently that the discovery of a tawny frogmouth chick who had fallen from its nest in the school yard led to an inquiry that naturally connected science, geography, maths, English, design and digital technologies!  Use the environment as a context for inquiring  across the curriculum 

FROM the environment

Last weekend, I had an amazing walk along the Barwon river in Geelong, here in Victoria.  At one point I noticed a ‘teenage’ magpie doing what they do at this time of year, nagging their mum to give them food (they even sound like they are saying muuuuuuum! MUUUUUUUM!).  I stopped to watch them for a while, fascinated by the interactions between them, curious about what almost looked like a tantrum as the young magpie momentarily lay on its back (!), wondering what they were eating, where their nest was and allowing my thoughts to drift to the parenting of my own children and the relationships all living things have with their offspring. I was watching, listening, wondering, theorising, connecting, questioning … I was doing exactly what I would want children to do in an inquiry classroom. And here I was sitting by a river with not another human in sight. Nature, it seems, is a gifted inquiry teacher herself from which we can learn so much.  When you take learners into the environment, don’t feel you need to teach/tell them too much. They will learn so much simply by being there and being encouraged to notice.

Environmental Education has been part of the learning landscape for decades. In the early 1800’s  Jean-Jacques Rousseau urged us to ‘study nature, not books’ since then there have been many, many movements, programs and resources dedicated to the cause. 

 And yet here we are – our precious planet in such dire trouble.

Maybe that’s why I have ‘dropped the ball” in recent times. After all this time, all this work, all these incredible, passionate devoted environmental educators I have worked with for nearly 40 years … what can we show for our efforts?  It is hard not to be despondent.  BUT I take heart. Greta Thunberg gives me heart. My own children and their passionate, informed friends give me heart. Schools like Howrah Primary school give me heart, amazing brave schools like https://www.thenatureschool.org.au  give me heart, the native regeneration acres of once industrial wasteland in my own suburb gives me heart. And listening to podcasts with teachers like Kevin give me heart. The work continues.

 The recent UNESCO report “Reimagining our Futures” is blunt in its call to action: 

 “We  need  to  take  urgent  action  to  change  course,  because the future of people depends on the future of the planet, and both are at risk. The report proposes a new social contract for education – one that aims to rebuild our relationships with each other, with the planet, and with technology.”

 It is nearing the end of the school year here in Australia. A time for reimagining. For me, it feels like a time for rekindling the fire I had let cool.  My passion for inquiry has no better home than learning in, about, for, through and from the environment. Time to take a deep breath and step, once more into the breach. I hope you will join me in thinking about your own connection to nature and the responsibility we all have to keep our children connected to the planet on which we all depend.

Surely as educators there is no greater moral purpose. 

How do you help build your children’s relationship with the natural world?

Children at Auburn South getting curious in the amazing vegetable garden!

Just wondering …

Pondering the place and purpose of ‘provocations’

I was on the phone when the small Melbourne earthquake hit last week. Mildly dramatic, a couple of things fell from my shelves and I quickly hung up the phone mid sentence! By the time I had raced downstairs, it was over. The various members of my locked-down family emerged from their respective zoom meetings and began feverish discussions in our hallway. What was that? Was that an earthquake? Are you OK? Do we get earthquakes here? What are you supposed to do in an earthquake? Do we stand in door frames or crouch under tables? Will there be aftershocks? How come the electricity has gone off? I wonder if it’s happened anywhere else? Where’s the dog? … If there had been a wonderwall in my hallway, it would have been covered in minutes! 

Apart from the fact that it was strangely stimulating to be talking about something other than Covid19, the inquirer in me was most definitely activated. We had a bunch of questions and theories and through the day, we talked, read, viewed and listened. We were eager to find out more and clarify our thinking. (And before you say anything New Zealand, Japan, San Francisco … I know.  We are all too aware it was nothing compared to what other places in the world experience!) 

Had I been in the classroom the next day, I am pretty sure I know what we would have our spent time doing. The kids would have doubtless come in talking about the earthquake, sharing theories and of course asking questions – they would have been ripe for inquiry. What wonderful concepts we could have leaned into:  form (the structure of the earth) causation, magnitude, measurement, location as well as concepts connected to human emotion and media coverage. A rich opportunity for inquiry indeed and one that actually links beautifully with elements of standards in our science and geography curriculum.  No need for a manufactured provocation here. All that is needed is the permission to inquire and we are on our way. 

The concept of ‘provocation’ is widely discussed in relation to inquiry. I have noticed an abundance of ideas being shared on social media. The word has become ubiquitous in some planning contexts (“we are just planning all our provocations for this next inquiry”). Ironically all this talk about provocations has provoked some change in my thinking and, as always, the best way I know to try to make sense of new thinking is to write about it. 

 Spending so much time at home, taking long walks through my surrounding environment, watching the view outside my window change each day has reminded me that our daily life experiences are already full of ‘provocations’ that get us thinking, questioning and wondering. It may not be as dramatic as an earthquake … it might be the conversation at the kitchen table that left you challenged,  a new system for recycling bins that has the street up in arms, the appearance of a birds’ nest in a backyard tree, the observation of a single patch of dying grass along your local railway track or the intriguing design of the new playground across the street. These moments have relevance to my life and the life of my community and can set off a chain of questions grounded in an authentic and meaningful context.

A desire to investigate is most often driven by something that has made us curious- we inquire when we want to know more, solve a problem, improve something, understand something more deeply.  And our inquiries often have the deepest impact when they enable us to make a positive difference to our lives and the lives of others.  Of course, as teachers we can intentionally construct and share provocations with learners with the express purpose of cultivating this curiosity. I have designed many such experiences in the form of materials, objects and resources, using videos and images or conducting simulations. These deliberate ‘provocations’ have a place. However, as much as I am a huge champion of curiosity I am increasingly wary of experiences we design and construct for children that feel at times like we are coercing them into asking the questions we want to hear.   

I was discussing this with my friend and colleague Shaz Bailey the other day and she pointed out that there can be a fine line between things we call ‘provocations’ (designed to stimulate curiosity) and the problematic idea of ‘front-loading’. I couldn’t agree more. Many of the things I see being used to activate an inquiry contain a lot of information and may be better used as a resource for investigation once children’s current theories, ideas, experiences and personal connections have been shared. In my experience, ‘front loading’ gets in the way of the rich information children reveal when we tune in to them rather than expecting them to tune into a text or experience right from the outset. As Sam Sherratt has said – the only thing we should be front loading is a washing machine. 

Up until quite recently, I have occasionally planned ‘provocations’ designed to deliberately unsettle or create tension. You know the kind of thing – trashing the classroom as a provocation for an inquiry into caring for the environment or announcing something that has been banned as a precursor for an inquiry into fairness.  I am feeling less and less comfortable with this as I reflect on issues of consent, authenticity agency and transparency. I still regard some simulations as potentially powerful opportunities for learning but I am more comfortable with them as a means of investigation (‘let’s see what we discover when we…’) rather than a covert provocation AND, even if it diminishes the potency of the experience, I think we owe it to kids to let them in on the fact that they are participating in a simulation. I have knowingly participated in simulations and still got caught up in the emotion and learned much from the debrief and discussion. 

Bottom line, If we have to go to great lengths to ‘get them’ asking questions, perhaps this says something about the journey of inquiry we are planning in the first place?  Does it feel forced? Are we manufacturing something that has no real connection to the children’s lives or the community around them?  Are we getting caught up in our own excitement about a video/simulation/activity and losing sight of authentic connections?  The best inquiries are perhaps those that need no manufactured provocation at all. I have seen some wonderful examples of this in the context of the pandemic which included Inquiries into the ways in which health messages are communicated, inquiries into what it means to be a healthy human, inquiries into the role of social media in influencing our decisions – and the way creativity and design can help us solve problems.  All these inquiries were developed in response to the teachers’ recognition of what mattered to the children and of the power of authentic contexts for learning. 

We inquire into things when we care about them. Perhaps a more authentic way to think about this is to turn our attention to what we are noticing about the children’s interests and what is already happening in the world around us and take it from there. Maybe the question is less ‘What provocation can we use?’ and more ‘what concepts are we inquiring into? What are we noticing about our children in relation to this? What might we shine a light on? How might we use this to invite children to share their own questions and theories?  

Our daily lives are rich with provocations if we are awake to them. The child who walks into the classroom with their arm in a sling, the rush to the classroom windows during a sudden hailstorm, the eye-rolls you notice in response to never ending nagging about litter in the school yard, the birth of a baby sibling,  the child that brings a nest they found out in the yard only to be berated by others for doing so…these moments offer a different kind of ‘provocation’ – one that has occurred at the speed of life. One that has its genesis in a moment brought to us from the children or from the world itself.   I am in no way negating the power of materials in particular to activate wonder and thinking but there is perhaps a more nuanced dance between what we notice first, and what we then design/curate. Using materials in response to our noticing (and then to keep noticing) may be a more authentic way to think about the process.

 We can’t go with every moment of wonder and nor does every moment lend itself to deep inquiry but as well as collecting, curating and sharing things you hope will activate curiosity, be similarly focussed on the curiosity that quietly emerges when you tune in to the world around you and encourage your children to do the same. Perhaps the only thing you need to plan to activate an inquiry- is to plan to observe more, listen more keenly and pay closer attention … 

…

Isn’t it fascinating when you notice shifts in your own thinking? I wonder how you interpret the idea of ‘provocations?’   This thinking is still unfolding for me but I would be interested to hear more … 

A tree in my local neighbourhood, spotted on a recent walk. SO many wonderings … 🙂

Just wondering 

Learning and living with uncertainty.

I took this photo earlier this week, while on a windswept walk by the bay.  At the time, I was bracing myself for yet more work to be cancelled or postponed as cases started to rise again here in Melbourne. Sure enough, we are back in lockdown and my interstate work is cancelled yet again (some will go online, some not).  Once more, plans are scrapped and alternative arrangements made but even those arrangements can only be tentative. Such is this new, strange existence in which the only thing we can be certain about - is uncertainty.

This image seems so apt for me right now. A metaphor for a new way of being. I have a path ahead of me but, beyond that, I really cannot see my destination.  Where I could once look at my calendar and feel pretty secure in the knowledge of what the weeks and months ahead entailed (of course, we never REALLY know what is around the corner) , now it all feels like a bit of a mirage…a blurry smudge on the horizon that may or may not come into view as I head towards it. 

Despite decades of banging on about the need for inquiry teachers to be ‘comfortable with uncertainty’, to resist the urge to over-plan and to allow a journey of inquiry to be responsive rather than predetermined - the last 18 months has reminded me of just how challenging this can be.  

But I also recognise what this time is teaching me. I have no choice but to be truly present to what is happening for me right now.  There is little value in investing in the process of planning ahead in such a volatile environment. Sure, I can plan (and I do) but I need to be OK when the plan evaporates: I need to be able to ‘pivot’ , adapt and think on my feet - just as we do as we engage with learners in an inquiry.  This preparedness to expect the unexpected and respond positively and openly to the moment seems as important in my life outside of teaching as it is within my teaching itself.  I know there are many educators out there who will relate!

There are some things that help me manage the shifting goal posts of my working life right now.  When I reflect on them, many are applicable to the way we work through an inquiry with our young learners. Here’s the advice I am giving myself right now - I hope it rings true for you in terms of your experience of inquiry teaching too:

Do have some kind of plan but keep it flexible and assume that it may not eventuate the way you currently envisage it

See change as an opportunity rather than a loss.  Ask: what new learning might this unexpected moment bring? 

Stay present to what is happening right now. Uncertainty can actually cause us to do too much thinking ahead (maybe?what if?) and lose the beauty and possibilities right in front of us.

Notice and name.  In the classroom and in life, taking time to identify how we are feeling, what we are noticing about ourselves can be really helpful in gaining clarity and feeling secure amidst a complex experience.

Maintain your anchors in a stormy sea.  Despite my ever-changing and now-volatile  working life, I try to maintain some routines that are predictable and consistent. In the inquiry classroom, some structure, routine and ritual are really important anchors that mean the unexpected is less daunting and easier to accommodate. 

Stay connected and keep communicating. In a journey of inquiry, next steps are designed with learners and with your team -  not in isolation. And that is so true for me any this stage time in my professional life. I better manage the vicissitude of my current working life through regular conversations with mentors, friends and family. 

Think big while you are ‘in the small.’  Perspective and big picture thinking really help us manage the anxiety prevalent in this time. This will pass. Things will change. We won’t get back to ‘normal’ but there will be a new normal, eventually. In the scheme of things, cancelled work is frustrating and disappointing but I am fine and have a healthy, loving family. That’s the big picture! This  kind of big picture thinking is SO vital as we work through an inquiry, it’s what ensures we do not descend into chaos and finish with a bunch of unhelpful and disconnected loose ends. Asking ourselves the question: What is this journey of inquiry REALLY all about and thinking conceptually opens the door and welcomes the unexpected in far more easily. 

To my colleagues in lockdown right now, all strength to you! To my colleagues in countries where cases are rising (thinking of my beloved Indonesia!), please stay safe and to my colleagues fortunate enough to be travelling, working back in school or enjoying a time of more certainty. Relish it!  Meanwhile, I am going to keep practising acceptance and gratitude as I fire up the laptop for another zoom  session.  😊

PS. I drafted this post just before heading out to do my allocated visit to the supermarket.  On the way home, I got an UNEXPECTED flat tyre.🥴 Needless to say my own words were ringing in my ears as I did my best to use the unexpected (long) waiting time to read some articles I had been putting off reading.  And to try to stay grounded, positive and accepting. I almost succeeded. 

How do you manage the uncertainty of this time? How do you manage the uncertainty that is so much a part of using an inquiry approach? 

Just wondering …

Kath

The Wonder of Writing.: what writing a children's book taught me about teaching writing.

In our attic there is a large storage box chock full of scrap books, diaries, lovingly decorated journals, autograph books, song lyrics, half-written poems and packets of teenage-angst filled correspondence between me and my best friends in school.  Second only to the crates of photos lying next to it, this box is the closest thing I have to an archive of my life. It is an enormous box of words. I occasionally wonder (and worry about!) what my daughters will make of it when I am gone… but I can’t bring myself to dispose of it. Words are like that.  As a form of expression, writing has always been my go-to. Whether for an audience, to capture a moment or feeling I never wanted to lose, to communicate with someone,  or simply to work something through, writing is a constant  in both my professional and personal life. It is often the case that I write the words I cannot say. 

I began my career having majored in children’s literature, language and literacy. I could not wait to teach young readers and writers. As a full-time classroom teacher,  supporting children to publish books, writing together for multiple purposes and using literature to inspire the craft of writing was a joy.  My interest in inquiry as an approach to teaching and learning only amplified my commitment to seeing children as authors and to mining wonderful literature for what it could teach us about language. 

In the early nineties, I was commissioned to write some books for a school-based reading series.  Along with my husband Stephen Ray who has a background in zoology,  I wrote books about snakes, beetles, lizards, eagles, frogs and nocturnal animals.  Combining my love for writing with his knowledge of zoology was an incredible, creative challenge that helped me understand so much about language and the communication of ideas. I have written many books for teachers and countless articles and blogs … but writing for children was an entirely different experience.   It was so much harder than I anticipated! 

 Many years later,  and many books for teachers in between, I had an idea.

  Well, I should say that the idea had me.  Winsome was like that. She waited until I was on a rare holiday, on my own, in the quiet of a warm evening when she decided to whisper her way into my heart,  and a new book was born.  It took two years and a pandemic for ‘The Wonder of Winsome’ to evolve from an intriguing idea and creative urge to a book I am now able to hold in my hands. 

Creating a narrative for children has been such another deep inquiry into the process and craft of writing. I feel as if I have been travelling on parallel tracks – one as a writer and the other as a teacher. As I have been writing, I have also thought a lot about the way we ‘teach’ writing to our young learners. In this post, I want to share some of the lessons I have learned.  They are not new ones, by any means, but I hope they are worth being reminded of…

1.     Writing  ( however much one likes it ) can be plain ol’ hard work.  The initial romance wears off. 

Expecting our young writers to work on a piece with sustained energy and enthusiasm is unrealistic. We need to acknowledge the challenges and talk about how we can work through the ‘dips’ in our enthusiasm. Timely feedback, plenty of opportunities to share those moments when they are ‘stuck’ and listening to real authors talk about how they push through those times can be so helpful. Share strategies that focus on the mental process of sustaining your focus as much as the specific strategies related to the craft of writing.  

 2.     Just because you are not writing doesn’t mean you are not composing. 

 Every writer’s process is different, of course, but something I was very conscious of was just how much time I spent thinking about the writing.  Some of the most productive composition work happened when I was not actually writing but on a walk, in the shower or in the car.   It made me think about the times I urged kids to keep going with their writing or the hasty judgements I made if they were staring off into the middle distance. Dreaming, imagining, visualising, rehearsing – these are part of the process and time needs to be available to young writers to do so. We also need to let them step away from a piece - even start something else and come back to it.  Flexibility, time and permission to ‘put it on the back burner’ can be critical to the quality of the piece. 

3.     Writing is an inquiry in itself. 

 Inquiry is an iterative process. It involves investigating, or trialling, or testing something and often re-thinking, changing tac, reviewing.  Writing is far from linear. Like any journey of inquiry it loops back in on itself, takes unexpected twists and turns and is in a constant state of revision. I was so conscious of the messiness of this process. Building this story was by no means, a neat organised narrative arc. Yet how often do we suggest to children that their stories start at the beginning, get to a ‘complication’ and finish with a resolution.  How often to we slip into teaching the process of writing  as if it were a fixed recipe? Do we help children see that writing is so often a non-linear process that is refined and reshaped over time? A story may begin in the middle…

4.     When you are writing because you choose to and about something that you care about, your desire to do it well is enhanced.

 I chose to write this story. I chose to write a narrative. I chose to write it about something I care deeply about.  Having made that choice, I felt committed to see it through.  I cared about what I was writing and wanted the words to connect with my readers.  Too often, of late, I have heard teachers talk about giving children choice in writing as something special – a once a week ‘treat’, an exception.  To deprive children of the opportunity to regularly write about things they care about seems to me to do a grave disservice to the child and to the craft of writing itself.  Choice should be the general rule rather than the exception. 

 5.     Writing is often a team effort. 

 While I wrote the book – it would not be what it is without the many collaborations I sought during the process. I had friends, teachers, parents and children all read it at various stages and their responses were incredibly helpful in the process of re-thinking and refining.  This is the case with all my writing. As a writer you don’t wait until your work is published to have an audience read it, you road test it along the way.  As young writers, our children need plenty of opportunities to confer with educators and peers. We need to help them feel comfortable with reading their work aloud to each other, swapping drafts for feedback, learning how to give and receive helpful advice. Writing in solitude and under exam/test conditions is about as far away from the reality of writing in the real world as I could possibly imagine.

6.     Receiving feedback is not easy

Taking your writing to someone is is a risky act and requires courage!  When we confer with young writers, we need to remind ourselves of just how vulnerable they may feel.  It can be hard to distance the self from the writing.  As we confer with our writers, let’s continue to remind ourselves to find what’s working for us as readers in their piece and to show a positive, sincere interest in the child’s intention and their subject matter before moving to a teaching point. My readers were beautifully curious about what I was setting out to do and made it safe for me to receive their thoughts. 

 7.     Brevity can enhance quality.

If you have ever tried to craft an abstract for something or even get a tweet down to the right number of characters, you will know that writing less is so much more difficult than writing more. Writing for children meant keeping the text succinct which was a delicious challenge for me as a habitually wordy writer!  It made me a better one. Let’s keep encouraging our young writers to aim for quality over quantity – to take delight in crafting one, really beautiful sentence. Let’s be careful aabout saying things like “Wow – look at all this writing! Look how much you/she/he wrote!” 

 8.     Words, illustration and design have a powerful relationship. 

The relationship between illustration and words is a profound one. Sharryn Madder’s art work elevated my story to a level I had not anticipated.  Her gentle, detailed drawings brought a whimsy to the book that words alone could not achieve. I rewrote some sections on receiving her art work. The designer (my brother Graeme) added even more shape and meaning to the story through the way he played with fonts, colour and placement of images around the text.  As I experienced this process, I wished I was back in the classroom. Now I would work on forging relationships between authors, illustrators and designers in the process of book-making.  How often do we do this? What connections might we make between design technologies and our children’s writing or between our passionate artists and our budding authors? 

 9.     Grammar, spelling and punctuation can be fascinating to inquire into - when the time is right.

If I had had to fret too much about grammar and punctuation in the beginning, I doubt I would have a book today. My focus on things like ellipses, the positioning of inverted commas, whether to begin a sentence with ‘And’ and a range of other technical decisions all came later. And by the time they did come, I approached them as an inquiry. How did other authors do it?  Was there actually a rule about this?  What if I broke the rule? Is the convention the same in Australia as it is elsewhere?  Grammar, spelling and punctuation can become fascinating points of inquiry as one moves towards publication.  Using mini lessons, and targeted small focus groups at the point of need (for example, gathering a group together who have all included dialogue in their pieces) allows us to meet writers’ needs in a ‘just in time’ rather than ‘just in case’ way. 

 10.  Having an audience can make all the difference. 

I wrote this story for people to read. For kids and for their parents and teachers.  I am writing this blog with an audience in mind.  Most of the writing I really put my mind to is for an audience and has a clear purpose.  I don’t tend to put the same effort into my daily journal because that’s just for me.  Our young writers need an audience that goes beyond the teacher. This, in itself, positions them as an author which fuels that powerful writer’s identity.  Perhaps I am not looking in the right places but I don’t see the lovely, published books in classrooms I once did. I don’t see children in author’s circles giving each other honest feedback about their writing in order to inform the next draft  - and the next.  Composing stories that become books for others to read is one of the most beautiful, authentic contexts for writing we can offer children. Without the thought that my little story might end up being read to a group of children somewhere in the world, I doubt I would have persisted,.  

The wonderful Matt Glover who helped me launch my book last week (check out his great ‘Author to Author’ site where authors discuss their writing process) , often reminds us that writing is one of those things we all teach, but don’t all do.  The journey of writing ‘The Wonder of Winsome’ taught me so much about teaching writing itself. It was a true inquiry process in which I discovered as much about myself as a writer as I did about the process of publishing. 

We are better inquiry teachers when we make time to inquire. We are better teachers of writing when we make time to write.

When did you last give yourself time to write?  What did you discover? Do your children see themselves as authors? Do you encourage your students to write for and about what they care about?

(For stockists of “The Wonder of Winsome” go to the shop at kathmurdoch.com.au)

Just wondering