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The Advantages, Challenges and Disadvantages of Implementing a Guided Inquiry Approach

The Advantages, Challenges and Disadvantages of Implementing a Guided Inquiry Approach

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The implementation of any new learning program within a school brings with it advantages, challenges and disadvantages. Through pre-identification, teacher librarians can gain a wholistic view of the guided inquiry framework they wish to implement. They will be able to use points of advantage to advocate for its implementation and develop an understanding amongst staff of its potential impact on student learning. Pre-identifying challenges and disadvantages allows the teacher librarian to predict possible hurdles and subsequently plan to mitigate their impact on the implementation process. Below are just some of the advantages, challenges and disadvantages that I have identified through literature so far.

 

Advantages

A guided inquiry approach to learning offers students an authentic learning framework through which they develop and utilise skills that are applicable to their lives outside of schooling. Carol Kuhlthau, Leslie Maniotes and Ann Caspari (n.d., para. 27) describe their Guided Inquiry Design framework as:

“a way to learn that prepares them for living and working in the information age. … [it] creates an environment that motivates them to want to learn. It engages them in determining importance and meaning by connecting the curriculum with their world for deep lasting learning. The Guided Inquiry Design framework is an innovative, dynamic approach to teaching and learning for providing information age education for children”.

It is clear from this quote that implementing a guided inquiry approach within a school has far-reaching benefits to the lives of the students that we teach. It is through this framework that students can develop 21st century skills, such as those stipulated within the General Capabilities of the Australian Curriculum. A guided inquiry framework combined with the teaching of the General Capabilities equip students to be informed and active citizens beyond their schooling years.

 

Challenges

One of the first challenges a teacher librarian may come across in their mission to implement a guided inquiry approach is getting classroom teachers onboard with the concept and opening a channel of collaboration. I have discussed the challenges related to initiating collaboration and ways to circumnavigate this within my previous blog post, Slow and Steady Wins the (Collaborative) Race. However, this post did not address why teachers were hesitant to engage collaboratively with the teacher librarian to implement a guided inquiry approach. One possibility could be due to the “embarrassment” that can be felt by a classroom teacher when it comes to their limited knowledge of the inquiry process (FitzGerald, 2018, p. 53). This embarrassment can also be felt by the teacher librarian as they deal with the specialist content of a classroom teacher (FitzGerald, 2018, p. 53). This explains why many teachers default back to a traditional research assignment approach to teaching units of work (Kuhlthau, 2014, p.9). Linda Gibson-Langford (2009, p. 3) suggests using action research to develop true collaboration between teacher librarians and classroom teachers as it “deepens conversation and challenges both researchers and participants to question the way things are done and to take risks with new ideas”. In its essence, action research creates a new blank space in which the teacher librarian and classroom teacher can create new ideas and learning approaches together.

 

Stemming from the embarrassment that many teachers may feel in regard to their lack of knowledge around guided inquiry is the issue of workload and time constraints. A lack of time to learn about, plan and implement guided inquiry coupled with competing demands affects both the classroom teacher and the teacher librarian. The adage work smarter, not harder comes into play here. Research has shown that collaboration is the most effective way to overcome this (Garrison & FitzGerald, 2019, p. 7). Building interdisciplinary guided inquiry units is one way in which teacher librarians and classroom teachers can use time more effectively (Garrison & FitzGerald, 2019, p. 7). This breaking down of the knowledge silos within a school makes learning more authentic and gives students the opportunity to apply their understanding of the guided inquiry process to different contexts.

 

Disadvantages

There exists many inconsistencies and omissions within the Australian Curriculum when it comes to inquiry learning (Lupton, 2012, p. 15). This puts an unnecessary onus on the teacher librarian to fill in the gaps. This view may be seen as a “glass half-empty” one, but as I discussed before one of the hurdles towards teacher librarians successfully implementing a guided inquiry approach is a lack of time. If the inquiry components of the Australian Curriculum were more streamlined and coherent, then that would allow a teacher librarian to invest more time into the other aspects involved in implementing a guided inquiry approach. There is currently a review being conducted of the Australian Curriculum, with the aim of “refining, realigning and reducing the existing content of the curriculum” (Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority, 2020, para. 8). Hopefully, the inconsistencies that currently exists will be addressed, taking the pressure off the teacher librarian to fill in the gaps.

 

Implementing any new approach to learning is always going to be met with challenges and disadvantages but identifying them and researching ways to overcome these hurdles is the best approach that a teacher librarian can take. At the end of it all, the advantages of a guided inquiry approach outweigh any of the challenges or disadvantages it may bring. The biggest advantage is undeniable: a guided inquiry approach to learning allows our students to construct their own meaning and subsequently create lifelong learning skills.

 

References:

Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. (2020). Review of the Australian Curriculum. https://acara.edu.au/curriculum/curriculum-review

 

FitzGerald, L. (2018). Guided inquiry goes global : Evidence-based practice in action. Libraries Unlimited.

 

Garrison, K. L. & FitzGerald, L. (2019, October 21-25). “One interested teacher at a time”: Australian Teacher Librarian Perspectives on Collaboration and Inquiry [conference paper]. 48th Annual Conference of the International Association of School Librarianship and the 23rd International Forum on Research in School Librarianship, Dubrovnik, Croatia.

 

Gibson-Langford, L. (2009). Collaboration or Co-blab-oration. Synergy, 7(2).

 

Kuhlthau, C. C., Maniotes, L. K. & Caspari, A. K. (n.d.). Guided Inquiry Design. Rutgers. http://wp.comminfo.rutgers.edu/ckuhlthau/guided-inquiry-design/

 

Lupton, M. (2014). Inquiry skills in the Australian Curriculum v6: A bird’s eye view. Access, 28(4), 8-29.

 

Maniotes, L. K. & Kuhlthau, C. C. (2014). Making the shift. Knowledge Quest, 43(2), 8-17.

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A Work in Progress: My Initial Understanding of Information Literacy

A Work in Progress: My Initial Understanding of Information Literacy

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I am currently at the very beginning in regard to forming my understanding of information literacy, so the views that I write below are my preliminary understanding of things to consider when embedding information literacy as a teacher librarian. No doubt these views and understandings will evolve and change the more I learn, so it will be interesting to revisit this post in the future to see how far my understanding has developed.

 

Annemaree Lloyd’s (2007b) article, entitled Recasting information literacy as sociocultural practice: Implications for library and information science researchers, resonated with me the most. I was able to apply her observations around how NSW ambulance officers and firefighters became information literate within their professions to my own experience of becoming a primary school teacher; moving from the educational theory learned in university lecture theatres (epistemic information), to undertaking teaching practicums (corporeal information), then to my first job as a teacher (social information). Lloyd’s definition of information literacy is embedded in a sociocultural theory of learning. She describes information literacy as:

“a catalyst for learning and at the same time inextricably enmeshed with learning. Information literate people have a deep awareness, connection and fluency with the information environment. Information literate people are engaged, enabled, enriched and embodied by social, procedural and physical information that constitute an information environment. Information literacy is constituted through the connections that exist between people, artefacts, texts and bodily experiences, which enable individuals to develop both subjective and intersubjective positions. Information literacy is a way of knowing the many environments that constitute an individual being in the world” (Lloyd, 2007a, p. 5).

To structure my current understanding of information literacy and how it applies to the role of a teacher librarian, I am going reflect upon each sentence in Lloyd’s definition of information literacy above within the context of student learning in a school environment.

 

“Information literate people have a deep awareness, connection and fluency with the information environment” (Lloyd, 2007a, p. 5).

For a teacher librarian, this sentence highlights the need to develop the transliteracy skills of students. Transliteracy is the ability to fluidly move between technologies, media and contexts in order to search, collaborate and communicate effectively (Sukovic, 2016, para. 2). For example, the skills needed to select, locate, and evaluate information within a book are different to the skills needed to select, locate, and evaluate information within a website, and users need to know both in order to gain exposure to a richer information environment. A library that is comprised of a diverse range of information in different modalities is required so students can proficiently develop and use transliteracy skills. Some of the transliteracy skill set is reflected in the Australian Curriculum’s General Capabilities through the elements below:

 

“Information literate people are engaged, enabled, enriched and embodied by social, procedural and physical information that constitute an information environment” (Lloyd, 2007a, p. 5).

This point touches on Lloyd’s (2007b, para. 26) “knowing locations”: epistemic (print and electronic texts that contain theory and are representational of a concept), corporeal (formed through observation or a “tactile and kinaesthetic activity associated with actual practice” (Lloyd, 2007b, para. 29)) and social (knowledge gained from first-hand practice and experience). In a school context, I draw parallels with this idea to the Gradual Release of Responsibility model that is commonly used within teaching and learning. This model sees teachers scaffold learning by moving through a sequence of modelled (student observes a task or skill), shared (student performs this task or skill with a peer or teacher), and independent learning (student performs the task independently). This model is commonly implemented with the teacher-student relationship at the centre and ignores the beneficial impact that collaboration with peers can have during the modelled and shared stages (Fisher & Frey, 2008, p. 3). Proving students with opportunities to collaborate and learn from each other is reflected in the following elements from the Australian Curriculum’s General Capabilities:

 

“Information literacy is constituted through the connections that exist between people, artefacts, texts and bodily experiences, which enable individuals to develop both subjective and intersubjective positions” (Lloyd, 2007a, p. 5).

Lloyd (2007b, para. 11) highlights how we need to use our whole body, not just our minds, when becoming information literate. Providing opportunities for students to engage with content through the utilisation of different senses via various modalities will strengthen their learning and development of information literacy. Again, it highlights the important role collaboration and social interaction play in learning. As I reflect on this element of Lloyd’s definition, I recall the Visual, Auditory and Kinasthetic learning style theory that was popular around the time that I was studying my degree. As a theory, its impact on learning has been challenged, but at the crux of it exists an idea that most competent teachers understand already: “that children learn through their senses, that environment and motivation are important, and that the human brain is pretty well adapted to processing the information from everything that they see, hear and do” (Sharp et al., 2008, p. 294). Understanding that learning is complex and thus planning learning experiences that engage all three can provide a richer learning experience to create information literate students.

 

“Information literacy is a way of knowing the many environments that constitute an individual being in the world” (Lloyd, 2007a, p. 5).

The ‘environments’ are the different contexts that exist within a student’s life which requires them to learn a related information literacy. Some environments that students may be developing their information literacy include part-time jobs, sporting groups, and hobbies. Groups, such as hobby and interest groups, can exist face-to-face on through online communities. In the school environment, teacher librarians can harness the use of technology, such as wikis, skype and the Google suite of tools, to foster collaboration, “break down the knowledge silos”, and expand the learning environment (Gibson-Langford, 2009).

 

The considerations that I have identified through the analysis of Lloyd’s (2007a) definition of information literacy are: the development of transliteracy skills, collaboration between students, providing learning experiences that utilise the students whole body and senses, and utilising ICT as a means of collaboration and expansion of the learning environment. As I mentioned previously, I am still in the preliminary stages of developing my own understanding of information literacy. Lloyd’s (2007a) definition combined with practical examples of how this applies within the workplace provided a context for me to develop my understanding. From this I was able to make connections to how it would apply in a school context and the considerations a teacher librarian would need to make when planning to teach information literacy.

 

References:

Fisher, D., & Frey, N. (2008). Better learning through structured teaching : A framework for the gradual release of responsibility. Association for Supervision & Curriculum Development

 

Langford, L (2009). Collaboration or Co-blab-oration. Synergy, 7(2).

 

Lloyd, A. (2007a). Learning to put out the red stuff: Becoming information literate through discursive practice. Library Quarterly, 77(2), 181-198.

 

Lloyd, A. (2007b).  Recasting information literacy as sociocultural practice: Implications for library and information science researchers. Information Research, 12(4). http://informationr.net/ir/12-4/colis/colis34.html#Lloyd_2007

 

Sharp, J. G., Bowker, R., & Byrne, J. (2008) VAK or VAK‐uous? Towards the trivialisation of learning and the death of scholarship. Research Papers in Education, 23(3), 293-314.

 

Sukovic, S. (2016). What Exactly Is Transliteracy?. Elsevier SciTech Connect. http://scitechconnect.elsevier.com/what-exactly-is-transliteracy/

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