Inquiry Cycle and
Inquiry Based Learning

IB schools around the world use inquiry methodology and it has become the process or tool that distinguishes the IB Programme from other schools. The more a school uses inquiry based learning, the more gains it makes.

If a teacher is not challenged by the lessons that they prepare, they will also receive the same effect from the students. Inquiry learning challenges the students and teachers. It is where structure meets flexibility, where we can build chances to be engaged in dynamic inquiry based learning by their own queries.

Inquiry (or enquiry, chiefly British) is any process that has the aim of augmenting knowledge, resolving doubt, or solving a problem. A theory of inquiry is an account of the various types of inquiry and a treatment of the ways that each type of inquiry achieves its aim. (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inquiry)

The Cycle of Inquiry

The Cycle of Inquiry shows the chronological procedure of problem solving. This teaching approach is a dynamic tactic to education that aids and authenticates children’s genuine inquisitiveness regarding their environment. The PYP curriculum model, research skills, PYP Planner and PYP Action Cycle are all inquiry-based frameworks. However, it is imperative to realize that IBO doesn’t prescribe any official inquiry cycle to use because inquiry can take various structures and models of inquiry are usually specific to a task.

Here are a few examples of inquiry cycles designed by various educationalists.

•    John Dewey Cycle of Inquiry
•    Kath Murdoch Inquiry Cycle
•    Kathy Short’s Cycle of Inquiry
•    Big Six

The PYP Action Cycle is very vital in developing any cycle. Some schools or teachers design a simple, open-ended student research or inquiry model. There are examples of inquiry units using Murdoch’s ideas posted on the Teaching Resources page

When does inquiry happen?

Teachers prod or explore the study by asking questions or presenting themselves with provocations to determine their prior knowledge, providing sensory experiences and assisting in expressing or framing genuine questions.

The teaching strategies which involve open-ended tasks into realistic contexts can bring up perseverance and engender creative or critical thinking. Student’s involvement and input are ways to measure that an inquiry is not simply occurring, but is also along the right lines. When this happens, a teacher should act like a researcher along with the students, to record the inquiry.

Please bear in mind that inquiry does not only mean designing an environment that facilitates raising a problem or issue, is enjoyable and safe for children, but it also means scrutinizing and honoring their breakthroughs. Celebrating their findings makes the classroom look like a community inquiry, wherein there’s a huge amount of support from the parents or teachers to promote the research done by the students.

The notion of inquiry cycle suggests that inquiry does not conclude. Nevertheless, it generates more investigation. The procedure emphasizes improving a teacher’s strategies, honing classroom teaching techniques and raising a learner’s accomplishments.

This learner-centered process deepens the dynamic progress of the student in the class, due to teacher’s creativity, guidance and resourcefulness. A teacher needs to keep a lot of materials in their resource kit that they can use, in combination with other tools, to meet the needs of students and take the learning engagement sections of the units to the next level.

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