Sage Rebuehr

Reading Reflection #4

Engaging Readers and Writers with Inquiry by Jeffrey Wilhelm

Chapter 7

Wilhelm concludes his discussion of inquiry units with a discussion of engagement and content areas.  Inquiry lends itself to engagement.  Students become active participants in their own learning.  They are part of a team of a community.  They are making connections to the content.  In short, the learning is meaningful to them.  I liked this statement:  “When all life has been drained from a subject, we’re back to desperately trying to motivate kids with test, grades, stickers, and pizza.”  Inquiry gets to the heart of learning and brings out the natural curiosity of students.   

I was interested in seeing how the strategies presented in the book could be adapted to content areas.  He provides examples of using QAR in a math class as students read a word problem and in a science class where the teacher formats the class discussion of a reading around the 4 levels of QAR.  Such a neat way of using it.  I had used in small groups, but had never thought of using it as a guide for a large group discussion.  Reading more about QAR has also made me think about why and how I use it:  it isn’t just about asking good questions as a reading, it is about moving along a continuum of understanding—from literal to worldly.

For a protocol we used Save the Last Word.  We actually all chose a different sentence from the same paragraph.  Interesting, huh?  As someone who usually doesn’t participate a lot in discussions, it was actually difficult for me NOT to say anything until the end.  I think in part that was because I just read my passage, I wasn’t able to say what I thought.  I know some students who could learn this type of patience J