Spiral of Inquiry

I want to use the Spiral of Inquiry as a basis for my critical inquiry of my practise this year. I think a bit more structure around my thinking will be beneficial. So to start with I am reading the article in Centre for Strategic Education Seminar Series Paper No. 234, April 2014 called, A"framework for transforming learning in schools: Innovation and the spiral of inquiry".  Helen Timperley, Linda Kaser and Judy Halbert

Here are some of the key ideas that have stood out to me.

"In a truly transformational learning system, the focus is on high quality and high equity for every learner, regardless of their starting point." p. 3 

This stands out because it has a huge importance to me and my practise. It is not the high achievers I get the most pride out of. It is the ones who have made the most dramatic shift. Those students who start off with few skills in a certain area, who have to persevere and work hard to make progress, are the ones who give me the most job satisfaction. They may still not meet the government's standard but I am so proud of them and what they achieve every day not matter how small the steps.

"no one has found a one-size-fits-all solution. Context matters. What works in one setting does not always work in another." p. 4

This backs up my ideas about not following blindly what everyone else is doing. It's about looking at what is in front of you, looking at other ideas and opinions and trying to create something relevant for your own situation.

"It also asks you to suspend judgment on how to ‘fix’ things that are not going well, because we cannot work out more effective ways to do things until we have a clear understanding of what is currently happening and why." p. 6

This idea of not jumping straight in to try something is challenging for me. I struggle a bit to hold off and just observe for a bit. I like action and results and I like to see these happen quickly. 

"The spiral of inquiry takes a different approach. It asks you to adopt a curiosity mindset to identify what is going on for learners and to develop some hunches about what is leading to the current situation, before deciding what to do about it. In this way you can work out what is working well so you can build on it, and what is not working so well so you can make changes." p. 6 

I guess the tricky thing for me at this point is, I don't really know whether what I am trying to fix is important to my learners. And although a lot of research and academics would say it is I doubt my 5 year olds would be able to articulate it. This is part of my issue around goal setting for this age group. Yes we want them to have agency etc but they don't know what they don't know and isn't it our job to decide what is their next step.

The idea of looking for the problem within our own practise is something that I feel I do well. This article states
"Most of us are not really good at identifying for ourselves how we are contributing to particular situations." p. 14
However I don't believe this is true for me. Tara and I are always changing what we are doing and questioning our practise to improve outcomes for students. We don't blame students or their home backgrounds and look at what we can do between 9-3 to support them in their learning. One thing that really annoys me, in fact, is teachers who blame students. Hearing comments like lazy, naughty etc (more than the occasional vent) is a cop-out in my opinion. We need to have accountability for how our practise impacts the behaviour in our class. If there is undesirable behaviour or attitudes it is up to us to do something differently. We are the adults, and the "experts".

"When considering what expertise to draw upon, our advice is to be wary of pre-packaged solutions." p. 16)
This is another thing I think we do well. Although we have taken on aspects of some programmes such as Reading Rockets and SEED Learning. We have very much picked what we wanted and discarded things that don't fit our philosophy or our learners. We do not blindly follow a programme but rather look for things that we think will work well for our learners and re-evaluate as we go.


"Taking action is a team sport – not a solo activity." p. 18
This is something that comes up a bit for me. While I'm enthusiastic about making change for the learners in my room, it can sometimes feel as though we are on our own. Tara and I are always talking about things we can try and are enthusiastic about new learning but sometimes feel that others are not so prepared to make change in their own practise for the benefit of our students.

We often hold ourselves to such a high standard that we do not forgive ourselves of mistakes in our practise. The article talks about how inquiry is making mistakes and how things are unlikely to go perfectly on the first try. We teach our students this so why can't we do it for ourselves. Being observed can be scary and feel threatening but it shouldn't. We do this to students all day, everyday. Maybe this is a good opportunity to think about how we do this to students? Are we doing it to or with? Do they feel as anxious as we do when they are being watched or given feedback.
"It is important that we find ways to make the risk-taking feel less intimidating." p. 19


I thought these questions were really useful and I intend to come back to them when considering what else I can do to improve my practise.