Inquiry Teaching Research Articles

Reflections of a First-Year Chemistry Teacher: Intersecting PCK, Responsiveness, and Inquiry Instruction

Many educators agree that science instruction should be dominated by inquiry strategies, while others stress the need for responsive practices to place a focus on student learning and understanding. Some scholars believe the two approaches exist on opposite ends of an instructional spectrum, while others believe they may be aligned and intertwined. Pedagogical content knowledge (PCK), the broadly accepted gold standard for science education, seems to include both. Understanding how teachers incorporate inquiry strategies and responsiveness and how the two intersect could lead to a more complete framework for K–12 science instruction and help streamline science teacher education. This qualitative single-case study examined the reflections of a first-year chemistry teacher by exploring how she demonstrated responsiveness to students while maintaining a teaching orientation of inquiry-based instruction. Results indicated that responsiveness depended on a high level of PCK and led to higher or lower levels of inquiry based on the students’ need for teacher support. Additionally, findings showed that the teacher’s stated and demonstrated beliefs about inquiry were disconnected. Finally, a gap between science conceptual understanding and mathematics PCK suggested the need to support more innovative mathematics pedagogical strategies during physical science teacher education.

Exploring the Role of TPACK in Promoting Inquiry-based Learning in 21

The realm of science education is grappling with the growing demand to equip learners with the scientific reasoning and technological capabilities vital for the 21st century. In light of this, the present study delves into how Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) can enhance inquiry-driven approaches in modern-day science education. Using a literature review as its methodological approach, this research ascertains that TPACK is pivotal in making inquiry-based learning more accessible in science pedagogy. Specifically, educators who possess a profound grasp of TPACK can seamlessly weave technology into science lessons, tailor their teaching methods to cater to student requirements, and combine scientific factual knowledge with analytical reasoning abilities. As it pertains to applying an inquiry-driven curriculum, TPACK empowers educators to design engaging, collaborative, and experiential learning scenarios within the ambit of scientific exploration. Consequently, this study sheds light on the instrumental role of TPACK in science education of the 21st century, advocating for a more dynamic and learner-focused approach. This research underscores the need for specialized training and continual professional enhancement with a spotlight on cultivating TPACK skills among science educators. Furthermore, the insights derived from this study can pave the way for avant-garde curriculum frameworks and pedagogical structures, further championing inquiry-oriented instruction in contemporary science education.
 Keywords: TPACK, science education, inquiry based learning, 21st century

“Re-Hooking” in the Field: Negotiating Power, Privilege, and Whiteness in Qualitative Inquiry

This paper outlines my experience as an early career researcher engaging with my power and privilege embedded in my white, English-speaking identity while working with Mexican American male-identifying research participants. Utilizing critical race theory as a framework, this paper chronicles my reflections on un/hooking from whiteness within the context of scholarly inquiry. Specifically, I draw inspiration from a qualitative research project to anchor the discussion of privileged epistemologies and power structures embedded in the inquiry process and academia more broadly, and how race can intersect with how we negotiate our roles, methods, and subjectivities as qualitative scholars. More broadly, this paper explores notions of knowledge and agency in educational inquiry against the question of whose stories are told, how, for whom, and by whom. This paper contributes to the conversation and efforts toward disentangling from whiteness and the epistemologies around which research, higher education, and society are structured to instead magnify the voices and experiences of participants through more egalitarian inquiry practices.

The Effect of Inquiry Teaching Method on Students’ Academic Achievement in Biology in Etung Local Government Area of Cross River State, Nigeria

The Effect of Inquiry Teaching Method on Students’ Academic Achievement in Biology in Etung Local Government Area of Cross River State, Nigeria

Kreativiti Guru Dalam Pengajaran Sains Sekolah Rendah: Mengenal Pasti Elemen Amalan Pedagogi Kreatif Guru Sains Menggunakan Nominal Group Technique (NGT)

This article is discussing about the application of Nominal Group Technique (NGT) in identifying the elements of creativity through inquiry in teaching science. The objective is to determine to what extent this technique can adopted in assessing the elements of creative science inquiry in teaching. This technique was conducted in first phase of researcher’s research about the design development of a Creative through Inquiry (CSi) pedagogy model to identify the usability of that model among primary school science teachers. The findings show this technique can help the researcher to obtain the data in simple and fastest way because the usability of the technique applied can acquire directly from the items’ percentage score.

Editorial

I am delighted to announce the publication of the inaugural issue of “Qualitative Inquiry in Education: Theory & Practice (QIETP)” under the umbrella of EDU Publishing. It’s a great pleasure to reconnect with you through this new journal. QIETP, being the first thematic journal in its field in Türkiye, builds upon the experience I gained during my 10-year tenure (2013-2023) as the founding and chief editor of the Journal of Qualitative Research in Education (ENAD). I aim to advance this experience further in QIETP. I am fully confident that, with the support of our valued authors, reviewers, editors, and readers, QIETP will soon earn a respectable position in the field. The first issue of QIETP comprises 5 articles: 4 research articles and 1 review study. The first study in this issue, “A critical view to educational technologies in the context of social inequalities,” comes from Fatma Akgün, Cem Çuhadar, and Şenay Ozan Deniz of Trakya University. The authors have examined the use of technology in the learning-teaching process from a phenomenological perspective regarding social equality. The second study, “A critical overview of Turkish research on 21st-century skills in education: 2017- 2022,” is authored by H. Ferhan Odabaşı, Elif Akyol Emmungil, Elif Atabay, and Melkaç Değer Demir from Anadolu University. This article evaluates studies conducted in Türkiye between 2017 and 2022 on 21st-century skills in education through meta-synthesis. The third study in this issue is “How to integrate sustainable development in English lessons: Reflections from teachers, students, and academicians,” conducted by Yasemen Şanal, Sena Sezgin, Seden Doğa Döker, Furkan Yavuz, and Gülçin Mutlu from İzmir Democracy University. In their qualitative descriptive study, the authors aimed to examine the characteristics of a middle school foreign language curriculum that incorporates the concept of sustainability. The fourth study of this issue, “How phenomenological are phenomenology studies in educationalsocial sciences: A sample from TR Dizin,” is a research article by M. Emir Rüzgâr and İbrahim Sözcü. The authors have evaluated how much the phenomenology studies published in the national TR Dizin index in Türkiye adhere to the assumptions of phenomenology. Although the study’s findings are presented from a quantitative perspective, it was deemed worth publishing in QIETP as it directly evaluates phenomenological studies. The only review article in this issue is “Educational science traditions and qualitative research” by Ali Yıldırım from the University of Gothenburg. In this article, Yıldırım presents the relationship between qualitative research methods and two main traditions in teacher education: the Anglo-American and the Continental European. This informative work discusses both the teacher training in these traditions and their relation to qualitative research. I am grateful to many esteemed individuals who have shown their close interest and support throughout this process. I extend my endless thanks to all colleagues who have been part of QIETP’s boards and provided technical support. I feel indebted to thank Prof. Ali Yıldırım, a pioneer in the field of Qualitative Research Methods in Türkiye, for his role in forming the international editorial board and supporting the publication of articles in the first issue.

Contributor Biographies

Biographies of contributors to the Summer 2023 Issue (Vol. 15, No. 1)of Cultural and Pedagogical Inquiry.

CPI Welcomes the Summer 2023 Special Issue “All That Glitters is Not Gold: Culturally Responsive Online Assessment and Pedagogy in Uncertain Times” with Kim Koh, Jennifer Lock, and Cecille DePass, invited Guest Editors

Introduction to the Summer 2023 Issue of Cultural and Pedagogical Inquiry (Volume 15, Number 1) entitled “All That Glitters is Not Gold: Culturally Responsive Online Assessment and Pedagogy in Uncertain Times” welcoming guest editors Kim Koh, Jennifer Lock, and Cecille DePass. This Special Issue concentrates on culturally responsive, online assessment and pedagogy and addresses the ways in which educators and students grappled with online educational experiences during the 2020-2023 global pandemic

Voices of the Forcibly Displaced: Transition, Resettlement and Education

Call for Submissions for the Winter 2025 (Volume 16, No. 2) Special Issue of Cultural and Pedagogical Inquiry entitled Voices of the Forcibly Displaced: Transition, Resettlement and Education with Guest Co-Editors Marcela S. Duran, Jan Stewart, Don Dippo, Mohamed Duale and Cecille DePass.

Spirit, Heart and Reconciliation

Call for Submissions for the Winter 2024 (Volume 15, No. 2) Special Issue of Cultural and Pedagogical Inquiry entitiled Spirit, Heart and Reconciliation, with Guest Co-Editors Tiffany Prete, Celia Haig Brown, Jessica Keeshig Martin and Cecille DePass.

CPI Special Issue: "All That Glitters is Not Gold: Culturally Responsive Online Assessment and Pedagogy in Uncertain Times"

Introduction to the Summer, 2023 (Volume 15, No. 10) Special Issue of Cultural and Pedagogical Inquiry titled "All That Glitters is Not Gold: Culturally Responsive Online Assessment and Pedagogy in Uncertain Times featuring Guest Editors Kim Koh, Jennifer Lock and Cecelle DePass. This Special Issue captures poems, narratives, reflections, and studies on assessment and pedagogical practices from elementary schools to initial teacher preparation programs during the pandemic.

Improving Student's Critical Thinking Ability Using Argument-Drivent Inquiry Approach in Thermochemistry

This study aimed to investigate the impact of the Argument-Driven Inquiry instruction (ADI-Based Instruction) in thermochemistry on students' critical thinking skills. This study applied the one group pretest-posttest type of pre-experiment design. The subjects of this study were 71 eleven grade students of Public Senior High School of Ambulu Jember on academic year of 2022/2023. The instrument, namely the critical thinking ability test on thermochemistry, was developed by the researchers based on Ennis' critical thinking ability framework. This test consists of 10 valid items with a Cronbach's Alpha reliability of 0.782. The results showed that thermochemistry instruction carried out using ADI instructional model improve students' critical thinking skills with an N-gain of 0.731 (high category) and Cohen's d-effect size of 1.023 (large effect category) with an intermediate reliability of 0.619 (good categories). These results indicate that ADI-based instruction on thermochemistry can improve students' critical thinking skills. The implication of this study is that ADI-based instruction can be applied to other subjects who have the same characteristics of thermochemistry, namely having contextual, factual, conceptual, procedural, and metacognitive knowledge.

Reclaiming the Ontological Over the Epistemological: A Case Study Into a New Zealand Primary School Disclosing an Embodied Culture of Teacher Inquiry

This article presents case study research into a New Zealand primary school enacting a very sophisticated whole school inquiry approach to enhance teacher classroom professionalism and practice. A culture of inquiry manifests as an ontological ‘way of being’ in this school community, in the daily professional interactions between the teachers and leaders. This ‘way of being’ is evident in the way teachers and leaders work together in espousing professional expertise, trust, care and support to enable teacher inquiry for improved classroom practice to flourish. In this article we present evidence in relation to three questions: (1) What does inquiry look like within this school community? (2) How was collaboration and support implicated in teacher inquiry? (3) How was teacher and leader engagement in inquiry related to meaningful shifts in teachers’ practice and learning? The research contributes to new understandings about the ontological nature of teacher inquiry by uncovering important links between school culture, teacher and leader inquiry, and embodied professional learning and practice.

Building a community of practice: shifting an M.Ed. program to a PDS school-based cohort model

PurposeThe purpose of this study was to examine how participants experienced and perceived an M.Ed. program that had a school-based design. In particular, the authors sought to understand: (1) how participants experienced being in a school-based cohort and (2) whether and how participants experienced the three designated tenets of the M.Ed. program: teacher inquiry, social justice and student engagement and motivation.Design/methodology/approachThis qualitative study used semi-structured focus group interviews (n = 7) to examine teachers’ perceptions, using a constant comparative method (Corbin & Strauss, 2008) of open coding to analyze the data and determine emergent themes.FindingsThe findings indicate the design of this school-based M.Ed. program provided both social and academic benefits including strengthening teachers’ working relationships and their understanding of students outside their own classroom and a transfer from individual learning to organizational benefit. Teachers positively perceived the three tenets that guided the first year of the program, especially the ability to study social justice and student motivation in depth.Practical implicationsThis study has implications for teacher education and retention as well as how boundary spanning roles in PDS schools can impact graduate students’ experiences in schools. Given the current teacher shortage concerns, it is important to understand how M.Ed. programs can be designed with teacher needs at the forefront so learning is relevant and rewarding, both to the individual and the school.Originality/valueWhile there are many studies that examine the use of cohorts in education, particularly in doctoral programs, few, if any, studies examine a school-based cohort M.Ed. program for practicing teachers. This study also puts a unique spotlight on how boundary-spanning roles can benefit not only teacher candidates but also practicing teachers in their M.Ed. programs.

Influence of AI-driven Inquiry Teaching on Learning Outcomes

In the field of educational informatization, the integration of information technology with education and teaching is deepening. Rich information technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI), have provided efficient support for optimizing the teaching process and improving teaching quality. Inquiry teaching aims to cultivate students’ learning abilities in all aspects. AI can assist teachers in organizing effective inquiry activities, formulating scientific explanations, highlighting the relationship between problems and assumptions, and utilizing empirical evidence to solve related problems, thereby enhancing the teaching effectiveness of the course. In this study, we comprehensively examined the teaching process of inquirybased teaching. We analyzed the impact of four components of AI-driven inquiry teaching (questioning, evidence acquisition, explanation focus, and evaluation summary) on learning outcomes. Additionally, we investigated the variations in learning outcomes resulting from college students’ familiarity with artificial intelligence. Results show that the Cronbach’s α coefficient of the questionnaire is 0.863 and the KMO value is 0.865. The four components of inquiry-based teaching, namely questioning, evidence acquisition, explanation focusing, and evaluation summary, have been found to enhance learners’ learning outcomes by 10%, 5%, 1%, and 10%, respectively. The level of familiarity of college students with AI displays a significance level of 0.05 (F = 2.682, p = 0.032). The study results have significant reference value for analyzing the appeal of AI-driven education and teaching reform, summarizing the process of AI-driven inquiry teaching, and assisting teachers in using AI technology to enhance classroom teaching and improve teaching effectiveness.

Reducing inequalities among species through an arts-based inquiry in early childhood teacher education

This article is based on a study in outdoor arts-based education with Norwegian early childhood teacher students. Their teachers of drama and art & crafts (also the researchers and authors of this article) facilitated the specific arts-based learning environments and posed the following question: Which qualities of arts-based learning environments can challenge students to seek toward reduction of inequalities between themselves and more-than-human others? Four narratives were constructed from four of the students’ visual, verbal and audio presentations of their experiences from the outdoor places they engaged with. The students described their processes of connecting to the more-than-human inhabitants of those places, and more-less explicitly expressed changes in their attitudes toward the inhabitants and materials encountered at the places. The narratives, and their analysis, make visible how the students’ arts-based engagements challenged their anthropocentric values and could potentially lead to reduction of inequalities between themselves and the more-than-humans they met at the places. The discussions at the end of the article focus on the first part of the research question and sum up four qualities of the arts-based environments that were present in the four narratives. These qualities are imagination, self-initiated actions, emphatic connections, and time for aesthetic engagement. Cover photo: "Student D" (anonymous".

The Feasibility of Socratic Teaching in Theory and Practice

There have been extensive research on Socratic teaching in various subject areas in China, most of which are about the application of Socratic method in teaching and its enlightenment to the teaching classroom. Many authors have studied Socratic teaching through experiments and achieved good results. This paper reviews the theoretical and practical feasibility of Socratic classroom teaching in different fields. This paper introduces several common teaching methods, such as the lecturing teaching method, inquiry teaching method, practice teaching method and example teaching method. There are some similarities and differences between Socratic teaching method and these common teaching methods. Compared with these common teaching methods, the Socratic teaching method is an innovation in teaching. Some theoretical and experimental arguments can be obtained from the literature to prove that Socratic teaching is feasible in both theory and practice. Socratic teaching is of great significance to the education of most scholars, who can get some experience from it. Through the experience of Socratic teaching mode in the classroom, this study hopes to inspire teachers to be student-centered and pay attention to the guidance of students in teaching rather than indoctrination.

The unity productions foundation film and the C3 framework

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to engage readers with Unity Productions Foundation (UPF) films, which provide a powerful, inspirational digital tool for teachers. The organization's mission is to create documentaries, films and educational materials that contribute to bringing to light compelling stories of Muslim engagement through history and culture. UPF films and educational projects aim to promote peace and understanding to increase cultural pluralism and counter bigotry in our world.Design/methodology/approachTeachers will be able to utilize the resources provided in this paper to harness the power of media in their classrooms. Outlining the process by which teachers can follow the C3 inquiry using the film Prince Among Slaves will prepare teachers to see the alignment of the C3 Framework with their teaching. The “best practice” classroom strategies in structuring deliberations are ones that encourage students to fully participate and emphasize their voice.FindingsThis paper will unpack the practice methods that address the film Prince Among Slaves to be of benefit when sharing narratives through digital film and engage students in critical thinking through the C3 Framework. UPF films are the product of scholarly research and innovative production teams as the films provide the opportunity to visualize and explore multiple perspectives to understand historical content by providing a context for inquiry teaching and learning that is inclusive through deliberative discussions in the classroom.Originality/value The author certifies that this manuscript submission is original work and that all authors were involved in the intellectual elaboration of the manuscript and all parties have been acknowledged.

Voices of Black Faculty at Predominantly White Institutions: Coping Strategies and Institutional Interventions

Black faculty are underrepresented in the academy, and it is critical to clarify an understanding of how racism and privilege influence people of color working in academia. The aim of this paper is to examine the experiences of Black full-time faculty with racial microaggressions at predominantly White institutions (PWIs). Seven Black faculty members were interviewed using in-depth, semi-structured interviews. The results revealed the following themes of how microaggressions are experienced: ignored input; challenged credibility; cultural exclusion; encouraged to look away from discrimination; and stereotypes and intersection challenges. Furthermore, themes on coping strategies are found: overworking, outside support and self-care, and denial versus confrontation. It was found that faith, family, and extra university community support improved coping. Additionally, changing cultural mindsets and institutional support were noted as key to navigating the normal course of inquiry in higher education.

Exploring transnationality as a resource for promoting social justice in language teacher identity construction: Insights from an inquiry group

This study explored the transnational identities of six English language teachers in an Egyptian university context, using an identity-focused teacher inquiry group. Grounded in the theoretical frameworks of identity as critical pedagogy, and transnationality as a disposition that can be cultivated, narrative analysis revealed insights into what a transnational disposition entails, and how teachers (can) draw on their transnationality as a resource for promoting social justice in their work. Specifically, three prominent themes emerged: the adoption of humanizing teaching approaches, the bridging of cultural divides, and the promotion of transformative teaching. Implications for pedagogizing language teacher identity are discussed.