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Scientific Inquiry

Students today are noticing everything in the world around them, they are coming up with questions about why things are the way they are.  As teachers, it is our job to make sure our students understand the answers to these questions.  Students often have misconceptions about certain things or a topic in general.  Their misconceptions are how we as teachers know where to start teaching them.

Inquiry-based learning starts with a question that the students have to answer through solving problems.  The cycle for inquiry learning starts with asking an "I wonder" question and then having the students brainstorm possible ways to figure out the answer to the question, this is called the acquisition part of the cycle.  After they have brainstormed they come up with an "I think" statement and then design a plan and test it.  After they have tested they collect their results and analyze them and get ready to share with the rest of the class.  Students are also learning a lot of different skills during inquiry learning.  They are learning to observe which is one of the main parts of inquiry and something that students do all the time!  They are classifying different things into different categories, communicating their results with their classmates' results, and also asking questions.
When students are asking questions it shows that they want to know more about a certain topic and that they are eager to learn.  When we as teachers are teaching to what the students want to know they are more excited and engaged in the learning process.  Through inquiry learning the students are also figuring the answers to the questions out themselves and there is little help from the teacher.  

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