Description
We are excited to announce that Kath Murdoch will present this workshop for AISWA Early Childhood. Participants will receive a copy of Kath's soon-to-be-released publication that focuses on personal inquiry.
Audience: K-2
There has been growing interest in ‘personalised learning’ for many years now. Increasingly, schools are making arrangements to provide more opportunities for learners to learn to be self-directed and to have their needs and interests met through the curriculum. An inquiry-based approach is in itself, an approach that recognises the importance of learner voice and choice and of linking new learning to the existing knowledge, experiences and interests of the child. In this sense, inquiry has always been an approach that nurtured agency, but this can be amplified when children can pursue the questions, interests, problems, and wonders that matter to them.
Teachers who use an inquiry-based approach are committed to helping learners ‘learn to learn’ and to equipping them with the skills and dispositions to more independently investigate questions, problems, issues and interests. But what opportunities do we give learners to do this beyond the “units of inquiry” we may develop? How can we provide children with real opportunities to explore the things they are curious about? And why is this so important?
This workshop is all about bringing an inquiry-based lens to our work with children and, in particular, building out capacity to use their interests and questions to inform our planning and teaching. With an emphasis on the role of materials, play and responding to authentic opportunities for exploration, Kath will share ways in which discovery workshops and open-ended play experiences offer rich opportunities for inquiry and connections across the curriculum.
We will explore the following questions with practical tasks and lots of recent examples from classrooms:
• Why is personal inquiry important? What’s our purpose?
• What is the role of shared inquiries that might be more teacher-initiated?
• What is the teacher’s role in supporting children’s personal investigations?
• How can we help children identify their interests? How can we inspire wonderment and curiosity?
• How can play provide opportunities for personal inquiry?
• How can we use materials to provoke and extend thinking about key concepts?
• What skills and dispositions help support children as they inquire?
• How can we make this manageable? What systems and routines and classroom set ups make it work?
• How can we involve the wider community and communicate the importance of this practice to parents?
Presenters
Kath Murdoch
Kath Murdoch is an experienced teacher, author, university lecturer and popular consultant who has worked for many years in schools throughout Australia, New Zealand, Asia, America and Europe. She is widely respected for her work in the field of inquiry based learning and integrative curriculum in which she has taught, researched and published for well over 20 years.
Kath began her professional life as a classroom teacher in Melbourne. Her fascination in how students’ constructed their understandings - and her interest in the way questions and big ideas could drive curriculum soon lead to a passion for integrative and inquiry based methodologies. This passion has become a career long focus for teaching, research and writing and the methodologies in which Kath specialises are now central to curriculum frameworks in many parts of the world – including the popular International Baccalaureate, PYP program.
Critical to Kath’s success is her continued involvement in classroom teaching. Whether it is to demonstrate techniques, coach teachers or build her own repertoire of practices, Kath is committed to regular and ongoing work with students. Her classroom work and research feeds a dynamic and ever-evolving expertise in the area of integrative and inquiry-based learning.
Kath’s professional development offerings are diverse. They range from intensive partnerships with schools to develop inquiry programs and practices over several years through to one-day workshops for beginning or experienced inquiry teachers. Whether in her home town of Melbourne or on the other side of the world, working with a team or speaking to a packed auditorium Kath’s style is refreshingly practical, inclusive and always connected to the real world of teaching.
Terms & Conditions
AISWA Professional Learning – In Person Event
- Detailed In Person event T&Cs here. Below is an overview only.
In Person event conditions
- Attendance records: Participants must sign-in on the day to confirm attendance. A member school can also view this data for their staff.
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- Attendee swaps: Acceptable. The organiser must be notified. There are conditions.
- Walk Ins: Any non-registered attendee MUST disclose this to AISWA on arrival. A correct registration process can then be followed.
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- Payment Conditions: Price includes GST. Credit card payment only for Guests. Member schools will be invoiced post-event.
- Cancellation: Cancellation is without charge if prior to Cancellation Permitted date. Cancellations via this website. Late cancellations or failure to attend will incur full cost. Refer any issues to the Event Organiser. If AISWA cancels a PL Event, attendees will be notified by email and any payment will be refunded.
- Free event non-attendance: A fee of $25 may apply. See full T&Cs.
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Segments
Event Segment
Date / Time
21 Sep 2022 Starts: 08:45 Finishes: 15:00Delivery Format : In Person
AISWA Training Room Suite 1
AddressSuite 1, 41 Walters Drive
Osborne Park WA 6017
Australia