Practitioner exchange: Teaching Inquiry Learning in the Social Sciences

Abstract

The difficulty in understanding the guided discovery inquiry learning approach to teaching social science and developing the appropriate skills to facilitate student learning, is that many teachers most likely did not experience such learning in their schooling and so do not have the necessary role models. This paper describes how a week-long workshop in Nauru, conducted by University of New England lecturers, provided appropriate knowledge and skills for pre-service and in-service teachers to authenticate global disciplinary research methods and concepts through the use of local content in the local primary classroom. The metacognitive learning, about inquiry learning, achieved by the lecturers and teachers was facilitated by the intensive school as both modelling and practice are essential to social science learning at all levels. The transferability of the inquiry approach to other cultural settings appears to imply the effectiveness of using this pedagogy in differentiated classrooms and in high multi-cultural settings.