Inquiry
Learning
Learners Learn What Matters To Them
In line with the research of Jean Piaget and the Constructivist theory of learning, children choose how to construct their “mental models.” This choice by the student is what really matters. By developing an environment that provides each student with the opportunity to discover personal interest in a subject, it ensures the most significant learning occurs.
Learners Learn Deeply Through The Arts
Research13 has shown that the arts can be an effective vehicle for developing skills and habits that will benefit students throughout their academic, professional and personal lives. Arts education has been shown to improve the ability to approach all subjects more analytically and creatively, eliciting higher levels of engagement in classroom learning and therefore increased academic achievement.
Learners Construct Meaning for Themselves
The constructivist theory holds that students learn when their existing set of beliefs, theories and perceptions are challenged through conversation, hands-on activities or experiential activities. Arts- integrated instruction, combined with a constructivist approach, blend together to create an inventive learning structure where students expand innate knowledge about subjects, and compose new meanings that impact them individually.
Learners Use Multiple Intelligences
Learners must have access to several modalities to discover and enhance their learning. Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences reminds us to incorporate all learning styles into instruction, as well as assessment for the students. An effective curriculum expands children’s multiple intelligence – their artistic, social, verbal, math, intuitive and logical thinking strategies.
Learners Use Content Knowledge And Skills as Tools to Learn More
Intellectual tools that will serve students for a lifetime should be developed through rich, cross- disciplinary research with a focus on a theme.
Learners Use The World As Their Laboratory
It is important for students to understand and appreciate their community. By exploring resources outside the classroom and inviting outside experts to share information, children come to recognize the entire world as their classroom.
Learners Explore Their Learning Over Multiple Drafts
Students explore, refine and elaborate their meanings, which they construct over multiple drafts and express their evolving understandings through a variety of presentational formats, which may include art, dance, drama and music as well as oral and written language.