71: Inquiry Across Fields of Study Redux

Reflecting upon the significance of inquiry and research across fields of study, I thought about my own education and paradigms of pedagogic effectiveness. I remembered a very special integrated curriculum in seventh and eighth grade that involved an interdisciplinary team of teachers who guided the same cohort of students over a 2-year period in the process of creating a community. Students were to develop a new society based upon parameters determined by them and supported by their mentors. The students had to decide where, geographically, they wanted to build this community, how they wanted it to evolve, and what social, economic, and governmental units would be necessary to sustain and nurture it. This curricular model required the active participation of the mathematics, English, social studies, science, and health and physical education teachers. No facet of this learning experience would have been successful without the participation of every academic discipline and the valued contribution of every professional staff member assigned to the team. The process required sophisticated inquiry, research and higher order thinking.