Getting Past 'Inquiry versus Content'

Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. 1703 North Beauregard Street, Alexandria, VA 22311-1714. Tel: 800-933-2723; Tel: 703-578-9600; Fax: 703-575-5400; Web site: http://www.ascd.org

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Teaching Methods; Science Activities; Learning Processes; Curriculum Development; Science Curriculum; Science Teachers; Hands on Science; Science Instruction; Inquiry; Models; Educational Strategies; Knowledge Base for Teaching

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Robertson discusses the "perceived dichotomy" that permeates science teaching: teachers can either stress inquiry learning with lots of hands-on experiences or stress content knowledge and swap hands-on inquiry for direct instruction. Although a curriculum of unstructured hands-on science activities leads to shallow content knowledge, it is possible to teach with inquiry methods and still ensure that students acquire required knowledge. Not every item of science content can be taught in this way, Robertson says, but science teachers can and should make it one of their strategies. He holds up the Learning Cycle developed by the Science Curriculum Improvement Study as an excellent inquiry method, and goes through an extended example of following the "Three Es"--Exploration, Explanation and Elaboration--in teaching science concepts. Research on the impact of guiding learners through these three phases is discussed.

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2007

EJ766308