I found a great article entitled ‘Macmillan History – Guided Inquiry in action’, written by Charlotte Forwood. Forwood is a teacher, speech pathologist and author, and is the co-designer and lead author of the Macmillan History series for Years 3 – 6. This article discusses Forwood’s approach to using Guided Inquiry when developing an educational resource.

I found this article very interesting because it consolidated my understanding of Guided Inquiry, as Forwood discusses the processes she employed and how she created this publication, using the Guided Inquiry framework. She breaks down the guided inquiry process into 8 stages which I found articulated how I would approach my next assessment task. Forwood acknowledges the incredible work of Kuhlthau, Maniotes and Caspari and one of my own heroes of the educational world, Professor John Hattie, who has published work on the meta-analysis of influences related to achievement, which are key features of Guided Inquiry (Hattie, 2015). Forwood also cites the New Basics Report from the Foundation for Young Australians (2015) that articulates the key skills employers of the future will be looking for. Those skills include digital literacy, critical thinking and creativity – skills developed through the Guided Inquiry Design Framework that Forwood uses in her publication (Forwood, 2016). In her publication series, she includes a range of links and resources for teachers, so teachers are not spending precious time resourcing inquiry units (Forwood, 2016). Of course – this is exactly the work TLs could be doing, in terms of supporting teachers and the curriculum. Whilst this article could be perceived as a promotional ‘plug’ for her series, I liked it because she explains the research and processes she engaged in to creative an innovative resource for students and teachers using the Guided Inquiry framework.

Forwood, C. (2016). Macmillan History — Guided Inquiry in action. Access (10300155), 30(3), 14–20. Retrieved from http://ezproxy.csu.edu.au/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=lih&AN=118450998&site=ehost-live

Hattie, J. (2015). Visible Thinking meta-analysis. Retrieved from
http://visible-learning.org/nvd3/visualize/hattie-ranking-interactive-2009-2001-2015