This module will review the purpose and steps of conducting reflective inquiries and will discuss ways of incorporating reflective inquiries into your facilitation plan, including effective mechanisms of support, collaboration and sharing learning. Your objective this week is to further develop your facilitation plan and consider ways in which teachers in your setting can conduct reflective cycles of inquiry.
Focus of the week
Watch the following video for an overview of this week’s theme.
The resources and templates for this module are as follows:
T-SEDA pack components for this week’s focus areas: This is a pdf of the relevant content from the most recent version of the T-SEDA pack (version 8) regarding an overview of the T-SEDA pack, more information on the self-audit, and content regarding the reflective cycle for classroom inquiry including guidance for refining the focus.
T-SEDA coding scheme: This coding scheme will be helpful for your colleagues to revisit prior to filling out the reflective inquiry template in order to link their questions with the categories of dialogue.
Self-audit template: This is what you should have your colleagues fill out before they engage with any materials regarding educational dialogue in order to measure improvement.
Video 6 on the edudialogue.org site: This video describes conducting the self-audit in further detail, which may be helpful to share with your colleagues.
Reflective inquiry template: This template has three parts to help your colleagues record their inquiry details – part A has the blank reflective cycle, part B offers a planning and reflection template to help them plan their inquiry, and part C offers a case study template for them to record their inquiries to mobilise their learning afterwards. Tip: having a tailored case study template for your setting can be a good way of mobilising effective practice and progress within different departments or groups of teachers.
Video 9 on the edudialogue.org site: This video describes the positive impact that T-SEDA inquiry has had, which may also be helpful to share with your colleagues. There are examples of teachers’ reflections on their T-SEDA inquiry from around the world, and more advice about how to carry out their own inquiry.
Video 7 on the edudialogue.org site: This video on completing your reflective cycle gives more information about the reflective cycle and how to complete it.
Facilitator’s support for reflective inquiries: This resource provides guidance in supporting your colleagues inquiries and an editable, blank template is included in the document for you to fill out.
Do
Review and complete the following two tasks for this week:
Task 1: Familiarise yourself with completed versions of reflective inquiries
The following are examples of completed reflective inquiries for you to review to get a better understanding of what you will be asking your colleagues to complete. You can also share these examples with your colleagues to better prepare them for conducting their own reflective inquiries. These resources are from students in a recent Practitioner Professional Development course and indicate the types of reflective inquiries that can be conducted as well as ways to capture and present the learning from the inquiries. More of these reports, resources as well as videos of the students explaining the results of their inquiries are available on edudialogue.org.
Building on ideas between pairs in Year 3 (ages 7-8)
This week, continue to add to your facilitation plan and gather the resources that you will use to introduce teachers in your setting to the use of a reflective cycle for classroom inquiry. Questions to answer for your plan include:
How would you adapt the resources from the T-SEDA pack to your setting?
How can you ensure that teachers don’t lose momentum when conducting a reflective inquiry into their practice?
What support can you provide when teachers are formulating their inquiry foci and questions? (E.g. to ensure that their questions are realistic and not overly ambitious or unfocused).
In the audio interview that was included in the week 1 materials, one of the tips that Sarah shared was to hold a brainstorming session as a group because she observed that formulating good inquiry questions was harder than she had thought it would be. Using a jamboard could be a good way of conducting one of these sessions online.
