The most effective and innovative educators are researchers in their own site. They research their children. They research their pedagogy. Their research leads to new insights, to deepening their personal theories of learning and most importantly, to stronger teaching and learning outcomes for children.
Teacher Inquiry Projects provide educators with authentic purpose and context for their professional learning. Through learning about the children they work with, they also learn about themselves as educators and about broader pedagogical issues. Teachers find these projects very motivating as they are concerned with their context ‘right now’ and not only with a hypothetical group of learners.
Teacher Inquiry Projects are often small in scale but large in learning for the educators involved. When combined with collaborative professional learning structures, they also lead to new understandings, shared practice and a strong professional culture for the whole learning community.
The team at Lisa Burman Consultants has mentored educators involved in many various Teacher Inquiry Projects. They balance support with challenge through reflective questioning, analysis of data collected by teachers in their learning environments and critical reflection on professional reading.
Lisa and other members of the consulting team have mentored Teacher Inquiry Projects such as:
- How do Story Tables support the language acquisition in English Language Learners?
- Do we expect children to change as they enter the schooling system or do we change in response to them?
- How can imaginative play develop children’s vocabulary?
- Can we see the child’s view of the world through their use of digital cameras and the creation of visual texts?
- How does thinking aloud during modelled writing lessons impact on children’s use of specific writing crafting techniques?
- What impact does changing the physical learning environment have on children’s attention and interactions?
- Will changing “morning talks” to small group sharing circles impact positively on children’s oral language development?
- What pedagogical practices will help children in their first year of school build a positive image of themselves as writers?