Pages: 8

In the introduction, we set the conceptual stage for the book by highlighting the construct of inquiry-based teaching—its roots in theory and research and how it differs from discovery learning. We also chart the evolution we have taken in embracing inquiry-based teaching, first through our writing of the College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework for Social Studies State Standards, the grant-funded effort through which we created the Inquiry Design Model (IDM), and the development of a full-service website—C3Teachers.org—that offers practitioners a range of resources to begin constructing inquiries and implementing them in their classrooms. We offer a chapter-by-chapter overview of the book and conclude with a description of the revisions made in the second edition of The Nature of Inquiry-Based Practice in Social Studies Education.

Pages: 22

Chapter 1: In the first chapter, “Inquiry and the Inquiry Design Model,” we continue to set the context for inquiry-based practice by looking deeper into the scholarly roots of inquiry and the rationale for viewing questions, tasks, and sources as the foundational elements. We then step back to describe the different expectations of teachers, students, and ideas in inquiry-based classrooms; why inquiry matters; and why it is not the norm across all classrooms. We then center inquiry in the larger conversations around school curriculum, and we offer a brief history of how inquiry came to be featured in the C3 Framework and the attendant New York State Toolkit project. We close the chapter by offering a concise description of the Inquiry Design Model (IDM) blueprint, a one-page representation of the questions, tasks, and sources that define a curriculum inquiry, and with a discussion of eight advantages IDM offers to help teachers and their students embrace inquiry.

Pages: 22

Chapter 2: Three elements—questions, tasks, and sources—define inquiry-based teaching. In Chapter 2, “Questions Matter,” we tackle the first of these elements. After establishing the relationship between questions and inquiry, we turn to the relationship between questions and teachers’ pedagogy. Here, we highlight the two criteria that define a “compelling” question—academic rigor and student relevance. Academic rigor refers to the idea that a question is academically meaty and can be approached through multiple perspectives; student relevance demands that questions are related to topics and issues about which students care. Compelling questions that reflect the twin requirements of academic rigor and student relevance share common ground with Wiggins and Tighe’s construct of essential questions. There are important differences, however, and we think those differences are worth describing. The remainder of the questions chapter speaks to the important role that supporting questions play in scaffolding an inquiry and the role that students’ questions can play.

Pages: 25

Chapter 3: The second element of the Inquiry Design Model—tasks—focuses on the work that students do in order to demonstrate both their emergent understandings and their final conclusions. Chapter 3, “Tasks Matter, Too!” highlights the activities in which students engage as they address an inquiry’s compelling and supporting questions. Although tasks may be formative or summative, formal or informal, divergent or convergent, they are always purposeful in that they connect directly to the questions that frame them. We begin the chapter by outlining the challenges that creating tasks pose for teachers and then outlining the various IDM summative and formative performance tasks featured in the blueprint. As we do so, we provide a rationale for their structure and relationships. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the issues inherent in evaluating student work.

Pages: 27

Chapter 4: At the heart of Chapter 4, “Sources Are the Matter,” is the key role that sources play in building an inquiry. Sources have received considerable attention in the scholarly literature as the impulse to move away from textbooks strengthens. Using sources, however, is no simple matter, and unless they are thoughtfully employed, they can be as frustrating to students as textbooks are. In this chapter, we examine the general manner in which sources function within an inquiry and the particular ways that they function in the Inquiry Design Model. The chapter ends with a look at the instructional uses of sources and the ways teachers prepare and adapt sources for use in an inquiry.

Pages: 13

Chapter 5: Curriculum and instruction have always gained the lion’s share of attention in the literature on social studies education. There have been studies of standardized testing, but very few explorations of the kinds of classroom-based assessments that teachers work with every day. We began to play with the possibilities for assessment within IDM in our last book Blueprinting an Inquiry-Based Social Studies Curriculum. In chapter of this book, “Assessment and Inquiry,” we stretch our thinking even further as we argue that the Inquiry Design Model can be viewed as a classroom assessment system.

Pages: 9

Chapter 6: In Chapter 6, “Pulling the Inquiry Design Model Together,” we reiterate the importance of each of the individual IDM elements—questions, tasks, and sources. We then describe how these elements work to reinforce and support one another. The chapter ends with a brief description of C3Teachers.org and the benefits it offers to teachers.