Scientific Inquiry Method Assignment

Assignment 1: Scientific Inquiry Method

My school is a PYP school which, by design, focuses on promoting students’ inquiry and developing strategies for them to follow their own inquiries.  In, what we call PYP 6 (third grade), the unit this term is “Energy is fundamental to our daily lives”, which carries through to all of the students’ learning experiences including those in physical education class.  The head of PE asked me if I had any ideas on how they could explore the concept of energy within their PE classes (I used to teach PE so he often asks my input).  After talking through a few ideas I thought, wow this would be a perfect opportunity to develop this unit and the process of getting to the learning objectives using the scientific inquiry method.

            There are two learning objectives that we are going to focus on.  By the end of the unit students will understand the concepts of:

§  Different forms of energy (internal and external).

§  How different energies are applied in our everyday lives.

Since both outcomes look at different energies I start by making sure that lessons in this unit include various activities to explore energy.  I decide that the students will be engaged at several different stations, which lend themselves towards focusing on either internal or external forms of energy.  These stations will be:

1. Vertical leap - Students will measure their vertical leap from standing on the floor and then from jumping off a springboard
2. Tug of War - Students will engage in a tug of war with increasing amount of weight (additional teachers) being added to the opposing team
3. Endurance running - Students will record in partners, the amount of laps that they can complete falling within 5 seconds of their initial lap
4. Wall sits - Students will record how long they are able to perform 3 wall sits with 30 seconds rest in between each attempt.

For each station the students will follow steps in the scientific inquiry method.  The initial question will be provided for them.  

• Vertical leap station: “How does using a spring board affect the vertical leap, compared to jumping without a springboard?”
• Tug of War: “How does the weight of the participants affect the amount of energy it takes to pull the rope to your side?”
• Endurance Running: “Why do runners get slower and slower the farther they run?”
• Wall Sits: “Why can we not hold ourselves in a wall sit position forever?”

At each station the students will make a hypothesis specifically stating what they believe the outcome will be to the activity (experiment).  After they have written their hypothesis they will then conduct the experiment, recording the numerical Data for their partner/team.  Following the completion of the activity and data collection, the students will then analyze the data and draw conclusions about their findings.

            This model provides the students with a framework that can be utilized whenever they observe a phenomenon and have questions about why it occurred as it did.  In an inquiry-based curriculum, which the PYP is, this is exactly the mindset we strive to get our students into.  We want them to ask questions and be curious about why things happen they way they do.  Teaching using the Scientific Inquiry Model forms habits in students that when they observe some phenomenon and have questions, which natural for children to have, they then know the next steps for how to find the answers to those questions.  

            In the ideal inquiry world, the students would be coming up with the questions on their own for which to follow their scientific inquiry.  This is the only drawback of using this method in this situation is that the “inquiry” can feel a little forced.  If the students never had the initial question on their own, does it mean as much.  Then again, as I stated earlier, it gets them into the habit of following through on questions and seeing a path to reaching credible answers to them.  This is teaching them how to learn rather than content.