Authored by Katherine Oliver What is the biggest fear incoming teachers have when preparing for their first classroom? While there may seem to be a myriad of options from poor classroom management to a student uprising, at the heart of every worry is the ability to get student buy-in. Student engagement, behavior, and work ethic […]
Chances are if you’re reading this you are already an inquiry teacher who trusts IDM as a process for student engagement and learning. A series of past posts has already detailed the use of questions, tasks, and sources in specific blueprints for lowering barriers to entry for student engagement. But, how do I balance these […]
Many social studies teachers get lost in source selection. We can’t be blamed for it. It’s a hazard of the job. Our passion for learning and for social studies instruction leads us down rabbit holes that force us to make difficult instructional choices about what to share with students and what sources best fit the […]
Oftentimes the best learning happens in the most organic and natural ways. Learning happens when we are genuine. Too often it is easy to let complicated procedures or a set of rules get in the way of that. We see a really cool activity that involves setting up a crime scene in our classroom and […]
Student engagement fluctuates for a variety of reasons, some of the most difficult to control being personal, which often leads to greater barriers to entry. We can think about personal barriers to entry as any internal or external factor impacting a student’s access to a lesson, often beyond the teacher’s control. These might include who […]
Long gone are the days of the “sage on the stage” social studies teacher who delivered instruction through lecture and asked students to recall content on multiple choice tests. A surge pushing teachers to engage students in social studies skills that social scientists use on a daily basis (asking questions, accomplishing tasks, and analyzing sources) […]
Over the past several months, I have been embarking on my Building Block Inquiry (BBI) journey. When I first read about this approach to inquiry, I was excited; it truly seemed like the silver bullet, or maybe a Trojan horse, to encourage even the most skeptical peers and colleagues to adopt inquiry in their curriculum, […]
2025 was not just another year; it marked the beginning of a new chapter in my journey as an educator. I started the year at Morgantown High School in Morgantown, West Virginia, proudly serving as a classroom teacher, academic coach, and department chair. It was a great school, and I loved my work there. But […]
A class of 9th graders stand in a semi circle facing one wall of their classroom. The question, “Is progress positive?” is posted above three blank papers. They each hold one to three small sticky notes, and each note contains a question which they’ve spent the better part of their class period generating and refining. […]
In my work on building a chatbot to support inquiry design (I’m calling it deep IDM), a nagging issue has been the overwhelmingness of AI. Guessing you’ve had this experience where you ask a chatbot for some information, feedback on an idea, inspiration, or whatever, and the response is over the top. (here / here […]
I’m working with ChatGPT to build a conceptual framework for a chatbot that would support teachers in designing inquiry lessons using the Inquiry Design Model. My work began with an exchange about design parameters, features, and the structure of a chatbot to scaffold teachers through the challenges of designing an inquiry. We’ve learned over the […]
Time present and time pastAre both perhaps present in time future,And time future contained in time past.If all time is eternally presentAll time is unredeemable. —T.S. Eliot, Burnt Norton Teachers know all so well the unredeemable quality of time. It’s in short supply. Time constrains and fixes us in place. It bounds us to efficiencies […]
I’ve been thinking about a theory for using AI in history education. By theory, I mean what I expect to be true based on general ideas and principles. Expectations are fickle, so this is a tricky endeavor. Seems reasonable to talk to ChatGPT about this to help untangle my emerging ideas, so here we go. […]
Starting with Inquiry: A Need for Change: As a new administrator in an urban public school in New Jersey, I began my journey into Social Studies curriculum reform with a fundamental question: How do we effectively implement the New Jersey Social Studies Disciplinary Practices in a way that is engaging, meaningful, and culturally responsive for […]
It was fantastic to read this recent article published in Social Education, Teaching to a Better Test: Using the Inquiry Design Model to Reframe State-Mandated Assessment in Social Studies, which describes Virginia’s innovative spirit when it comes to state required testing in social studies. My excitement flows from multiple origin points. First, I was happy […]
Engaging with inquiry in the social studies classroom can feel like stepping onto a tightrope—balancing time, standards, and student needs all at once. But here’s the thing: you don’t have to dive headfirst into a full-scale investigation to get students curious and thinking critically. Small, manageable inquiry moments can transform your lessons, building student confidence […]
I’ve been using the C3 Inquiry Design Model (IDM) for over a decade. Generally speaking, I’ve felt successful and have shared my best practices with others in the field. But despite my students’ success in producing rich products from their work on formative performance tasks, arguments, and taking informed actions, the sensory experience of walking […]
“How do we know any of this is true?” This question has stayed with me for some time. A student, who would only be in my class for less than a month before transferring, asked it during my third year of teaching and my first year teaching a high school history class. My response at […]
Explore how taking bold steps toward inquiry-based learning can ignite curiosity and deepen student engagement. This blog post delves into the power of inquiry to transform traditional classrooms into dynamic spaces of discovery, fostering critical thinking and lifelong learning skills. NOTE: This is a reposting of a post from Kathy that first appeared on Imagine […]
Student engagement is the cornerstone of effective teaching, particularly in inquiry-based classrooms where curiosity and critical thinking take center stage. The principles of inquiry tell us that the more students are invested in exploring big ideas through meaningful conversations, the more authentic their learning experiences become. Successful inquiry thrives on this engagement. Inquiry-minded teachers, in […]
What will school look like in 2044 – 20 years from now? Different? For sure. Unrecognizable? Likely. Better? … I have come to believe two things about this question. AI can be a force for good in education, but we must be focused on the aims of education as we develop AI tools It’s a […]
There’s a TS Elliot poem from a play called The Rock. It’s a mediation on the human condition and our use of data… read on. Choruses from The Rock – T.S. Eliot The Eagle soars in the summit of Heaven,The Hunter with his dogs pursues his circuit.O perpetual revolution of configured stars,O perpetual recurrence of […]
This is the third post in a series on sources as the Building Blocks of Inquiry. One of the most innovative features of IDM is its interconnectedness. Yes there are separate questions, tasks, and sources. However, a good IDM will always have questions, tasks, and sources that intertwine and rely on each other. To this […]
With the rise of AI, I’m thinking about what it means to be human? How is the human experience lifted up or pulled down by AI? Do you care if it’s a human or a bot? If your interaction with an AI bot meets your human needs, does it really matter if it’s not human? […]
This is the second in my series on sources and the Building Blocks of Inquiry. If you made a list of the top 10 challenges social studies teachers would say they face in the classroom, you may get the list of usual suspects: lack of time, political squabbles over standards, trying to cover all of […]
In her book Humanly Possible, Sarah Bakewell writes about being human as culture, morality, science, optimism, and more. Bakewell opens with a musing on the Roman playwright Terence’s line about humans. “I am human, and consider nothing human alien to me” Bakewell explains that the line was a gag in a play that has come […]
This is the first blog post in a series on sources as the Building Blocks of Inquiry. In the short story mystery, The Copper Beeches, Dr. John Watson inquires to his flat mate, the famous literary detective, Sherlock Holmes, how he can sit for hours on end in wait for the next break in the […]
As an educator venturing into the world of inquiry design for the first time, the experience can feel remarkably similar to learning to play a musical instrument. I recently started relearning to play the piano and quickly realized that much of what I’d learned from childhood lessons were long forgotten. I recalled both the excitement […]
Waking up to the news of the world can at times feel like a dizzying whirlwind. Today, amid the escalating turmoil in Israel and Gaza, I listened to a news interview in which the reporter was asking a former Israeli hostage negotiator their opinion on what the coming days and months would hold for Israelis […]
As I walk down my hallways, I gaze at my students’ Black History Month posters that cover the walls and I realize how I’ve changed since my early years. This month my school’s hallways are decorated with beautiful images that celebrate singers from Cab Calloway to Summer Walker, athletes like Gabby Douglas and Doug Williams, […]
Inquiry at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center When I taught tenth-grade American history, I had a sign on my classroom wall that read Never stop asking WHY. As an eager new teacher, I had plans to utilize inquiry in my classroom and envisioned my students, under my tutelage, asking big questions and making connections […]
In 2019, I wrote about how I began my year pre-assessing student performance on the skills central to the IDM: (1) making evidence-based arguments. As we approach the second half of the school year, I want to share new insights for preparing students to engage with inquiry. After 2019, and in response to the impact […]
“We inherit our history.” It was a phrase I often used to begin my year in the hopes of sparking student agency and making history relevant. But as an early teacher in social studies and ELA, misconceptions about the importance of authentically investigating history filled my brain. I knew I wanted my students to engage […]
The first time I encountered inquiry I was immediately hooked. As a novice teacher, I knew that I wanted my curriculum to be relevant, responsive, and sustaining, and I knew I wanted to attend to those resource pedagogies through asking questions. I knew that I needed to plan my course backwards, starting with big ideas, […]
I learned about the Inquiry Design Model and C3 Framework as a first-year teacher. At that time, I was working with MaryBeth Yerdon and she brought up the IDM, C3 Teachers, and the C3 Framework at a department meeting. MaryBeth learned about inquiry the previous year at a district-wide professional development. Her enthusiasm about inquiry […]
In classrooms, we use inquiries to deepen student understanding of content and to sharpen student skills towards making evidence-based arguments, asking important questions, and taking informed action. In the past, I’ve worked with teachers on adopting the language of inquiry, not only as they learn to create and deploy inquiries, but as general praxis. In […]
I recently zoomed with Nick Stamoulacatos, Supervisor of Social Studies at Syracuse City School District and one of the writers on the article “Countering the Past of Least Resistance” in that latest Social Education. We talked about Syracuse City Schools inquiry initiative and the inquiry loop featured in the article. Can you give me a […]
Image of New York State Archives and Museum in Albany, New York Making connections with cultural centers offers educators a measure of expertise outside their own content knowledge and pedagogical skill. Doing so also offers valuable resources that can be used to help bring history to life. These advantages suggest why connections with cultural centers […]
As I recently waited to pick up my child from school, I noticed a plaque that said the school was built in 1939 as part of the New Deal Works Progress Administration. I had walked by this sign several times and never noticed. Putting on my teacher hat, I thought about the many questions this […]
The following interview with Kathy Swan, SG Grant, and John Lee by Rozella Clyde was previously published in the 2021 November/December edition of Social Education Q. What were your original goals when you began working on the C3 Framework? A. When we first started working on the C3 Framework 10 years ago, we were responding […]
As a social studies educator I have heard all the excuses as to why social studies is not a priority within our elementary school classrooms. “There isn’t enough time.” “We need to focus on reading and math skills.” “Social Studies isn’t tested so it really doesn’t matter.” These excuses are gut wrenching and disheartening, because […]
When Inquiry Hits a Nerve I recently read Isabel Wilkerson’s bestselling book, Caste: The Origins of our Discontents. I found Wilkerson’s argument intellectually stimulating and began to think about how I could incorporate her book into social studies curriculum in central Kentucky. There are many challenges to incorporating modern scholarship into secondary social studies. Will […]
Elementary classes have a lot of curricula competing for airtime. Reading, math, writing, and many other vital and worthy topics fill the day. During a packed day, how can social studies inquiry fit into the schedule? Moreover, students get worn down and weighed down with everything they are expected to learn from the disciplines. Sometimes […]
Recently, I read social science researchers are way too weird. WEIRD stands for Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic. Between 2003-2007, 96% of behavioral science research used WEIRD subjects. Accordingly, conclusions about the human mind are based on this very specific demographic group. However, WEIRD subjects are, well, weird themselves
In December of 2016, I submitted a blog about the community effort to save the Fishkill Supply Depot. Two year later and we are still fighting to keep this historic site from being commercially developed. I became a trustee for the Friends of the Fishkill Supply Depot and became actively
“RULE #26 … Written material deemed inappropriate will be destroyed?” inquisitively asks Rafe Katchadourian as he sits in Principal Dwight’s clutches, after his notebook of prize drawings, “that means everything” to him has been confiscated. “ Bring the yellow bucket …” (of toxic sludge) orders the ruthless Principal Dwight, as the
There is one thing on which both sides of the political spectrum agree – our country is in a hyper-partisan era. Tribal partisanship and blind uncritical acceptance of information has become all too banal. However you position yourself on the political spectrum, teachers are in a precarious position as they
I am a first year teacher. At almost 45 years old, I have just now found where I am supposed to be and what I am supposed to do…well, kind of. Like any new teacher, I am trying to drink from a firehose and be everything to everybody. My age
“EVERY single thing you have on flies in the face of rule #22 … Are you telling me you haven’t read our Code of Conduct?” the ruthless Principal Dwight tells middle schooler Rafe Khatchadorian in the hilarious comedy Middle School the Worst Years of My Life, based on James Patterson’s
I used to think that the real value of inquiry was to create autonomous learners, but now I think that it is to expose gaps in knowledge and skill that used to be covered up through direct instruction. Direct instruction is a singular story that moves at the pace of
“Sorry, Carly,” she said, looking at me with shame in her eyes. “I had to cut the social studies lesson.” It was a Friday night. A friend of mine, “Ms. Kyles,” who teaches 4th grade, was sharing the stressful week she had. Generally, Ms. Kyles indicated, she had a good
“It’s the zombie apocalypse!” shouts my student. “Not really, but turn that statement into a question, Is it the zombie apocalypse?” I respond. While I was disappointed one of my students thought a video showing pilgrims on the hajj in Mecca were zombies, I was pleased by the overall level
Looking for a Roadmap inquirED was looking for roadmap for our Elementary Social Studies curriculum. We wanted something that showed us the destination, but allowed us to select the path. Whatever we chose, it had to align with our definition of inquiry-based learning. Inquiries must start with a complex, engaging
