Friday, December 8, 2017

Inquiry Math

As an educator, I found teaching math to students within the grades of 7-12 somewhat difficult to make engaging and interactive for the students involved; and we all know how much they emphasize making our lessons engaging and interactive during teachers college. By the end of it, our professors and associate teachers may sound like broken records.

I spent a lot of my time looking through many math resource websites, trying to find methods of teaching that spend more time engaging students in the learning process, and less time dictating notes from the board/projector. So when I started teaching full time in my first year after teachers college, and struggled to engage my students in math, I tried using Inquiry Based Learning techniques to the math concepts being taught.

From a student point-of-view, inquiry-based learning focuses on investigating an open question or problem. They must use evidence-based reasoning and creative problem-solving to reach a conclusion, which they must defend or present.

It is great tool in any classroom because most inquiry based tasks can be designed to accommodate students with learning disabilities, and students who have identified multiple intelligences. It allows students to work together/independently to draw conclusions to questions presented to them, base don their prior knowledge and understanding, and challenges them to build on what they know but making predictions or inferences regarding what they are learning. This website is a great resource that has inquiry based learning activities, prompts, assessments, lessons, and games that can be used to engage your students in the learning process, and make math class more enjoyable! 

Find the link to the website here: http://www.inquirymaths.com/

https://www.prodigygame.com/blog/inquiry-based-learning-definition-benefits-strategies/
http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/literacynumeracy/inspire/research/CBS_InquiryBased.pdf

Cheers!

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