Inquiry education

Inquiry education (sometimes known as the inquiry method) is a student-centered method of education focused on asking questions. Students are encouraged to ask questions which are meaningful to them, and which do not necessarily have easy answers; teachers are encouraged to avoid speaking at all when this is possible, and in any case to avoid giving answers in favor of asking more questions. The method was advocated by Neil Postman and teacher adhering to the inquiry method in pedagogy must behave very differently from a traditional teacher. Postman and Weingartner suggest that inquiry teachers have the following characteristics (pp. 34-37):

• they avoid telling students what they "ought to know";
• they talk to students mostly by questioning, and especially by asking divergent questions;
• they do not accept short, simple answers to questions;
• they encourage students to interact directly with one another, and avoid mediating or judging what is said in student interactions;
• they do not summarize students' discussion;
• they do not plan the direction of their lessons in advance, but allow it to develop in response to students' interests;
• their lessons pose problems to students;
• they gauge their success by change in students' inquiry behaviors (with the above characteristics of "good learners" as a goal).

In an example from the above-mentioned book, students in the Virgin Islands who participated in a voluntary program of this sort described it as being not so much a class as "more like group therapy."

See also

Educational philosophy -- Pedagogy -- School reform -- Neil Postman

References

• Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner. Teaching as a Subversive Activity. New York: Dell, 1969.