Inquiry-Based Study

During my time serving, I observed that many students do not receive the support they need from their families’ due to the language barrier. I learned that most students participating in this program value their education and discover that they have the potential and ability to become successful.

National Center for Education Statistics which is part of the United States’ DOE Institute of Education Sciences that collects, analyzes, and publishes statistics in education. (NCES, n. d.)

Meeting the needs of a diverse student population continues to be a problem in American classrooms. “While the student population is rapidly becoming more diverse, the teaching

Currently, I am student teaching at Alfred E. Zampella PS #27 School in the district of Jersey City. The school is located in a busy city, next to John F. Kennedy St. which is especially busy in the morning and during rush hour. This results in several late students on a day to day basis. On the other hand, this school is also highly accessible and as a little over a thousand students. The school has grade levels from kindergarten to 8th grade, and has a mix of general, special, and inclusion education classrooms. Typically, families that enroll their students into this school are of lower-middle socio-economic class, and tend to be majority Hispanic, Indian, and African American, with few Caucasians and Asians. This school provides a variety of special programs for their ESL students and special need students. Students may be offered speech language pathology, occupational therapy, physical therapy, ESL programs, reading recovery, and counseling.

As parents, you may remember Geography; History; Business and Economics; and Civics and Citizenship as being about absorbing facts that schools thought important for you to learn. Or you might remember doing projects that seemed like time-fillers in the scheme of what was important at school (What is Inquiry Based Learning, 2004). You will also be aware of how fast the world is changing and the impact of technology on the growth of information that surrounds us. You may have experienced redundancy, elections or a global recession and understand that knowing facts is not very useful for navigating difficult times. Facts alone do not educate students in what is needed to think critically and creatively about a situation, to find opportunities in hardship or to learn and relearn in the new knowledge economy (Warlick, 2013). Inquiry learning is a way of addressing the teaching of skills and dispositions that will be essential for your children to thrive as active and informed citizens of the future (Reynolds, 2014; ACARA, 2016).

Adapt learning environments, instructional strategies, and assessment techniques to meet the needs of culturally and developmentally diverse students.

We will house kids who are products of all facets of society. For example, children of immigrants, children who have affluence, children who are loved and cared for greatly and children who may be in a situation of neglect. Teaching is about reaching out to each student, helping them to overcome challenges and be the best that they can be. It seems that an increasing number of these challenges may not be academic in nature. I believe that conquering these challenges actually beings with the little community forming within our classrooms. As teachers we have the obligation to teach our students how to have respect and compassion for one another. How to be on the same team and work together, no matter each person’s background.

Most of the students in my culturally diverse school enter my classroom with wisdom and knowledge from their home experiences that can be used to expand their learning even further. The positivity from the learning in my classroom are exponentially greater when my students feel the appreciation and respect that I have for the rich cultural value that their family contributes to the ever-growing educational environment. I believe that young children learn best in a relational, interactive mode rather than focusing on the simple rote instruction.

Classrooms will be filled with a variety of students coming from many different cultures and backgrounds. Teachers need to acknowledge each student will be different in this aspect and will have had different experiences in their lives. As the class moves forward, the goal is to provide students with the same experiences, just with through different lenses. To do this, the classroom must have a strong sense of community and a

In today’s classrooms, schools and educational settings, teachers and educators are overloaded with the responsibility to produce data, analyse students learning and development and assess this against the National Quality Framework outcomes, the Australian curriculum and State Curriculum and Standards. With this high demand each day, teachers and educators need to find a way to best utilise their time with their students’ and use strategies and learning approaches to get the most out of the learning experiences. By integrating an inquiry approach into a classroom, teachers and educators are providing students with a well-rounded approach to learning. Murdoch (2015) describes an inquiry approach as ‘an approach that places the learner

Cultural diversity has been a major issue of concern for several decades, and it has affected institutions of learning, where facilitators have to balance the family and school involvement in enhancing learning. Establishing a meaningful environment for students with diverse backgrounds enhances positive performance in their academic, personal, and professional objectives. A healthy relationship with family members involves identifying the needs of each family’s cultural stand; this is because a culture may play a major role in defining a family’s responsiveness to a school’s involvement. The globalization aspect has facilitated the creation of a multicultural society, and hence the need for an education system that addresses the need to

The diversity found in public schools are those who speak another language other than English, come from different cultural backgrounds, are different socioeconomically, have learning disabilities, physical conditions, have different sexual orientations or genders. Students that are not straight, European American, and come from a comfortable or high socioeconomic status, resulting in private schools or have accessibility to paid for tutoring, are not always at arm’s reach for help or proper resources regarding their education at home or school, in some cases. These students face challenges and overcome them in a plethora of ways.

Whitney high school is one of the finest schools in the state of California which has continuously posted excellent performance, particularly in the state-wide examinations. In the recent times, this performance trend has been negatively affected due to the admission of several immigrant students who have several learning deficiencies and are, therefore, in a dire need for an expanded curriculum that is inclusive of their learning needs. Teachers in Whitney school have got several years of experience teaching predominantly white and native students. As a matter of fact, nearly three-quarters of the teacher population has had no contact with students from other racial backgrounds. Some of the instructional materials used in the school are

Disproportionate representations of culturally or linguistically different and economically disadvantaged students within the education system are everyday occurrences. Especially affected by this are Hispanic, American Indian and African American students. When being different means that a student is not able to receive information through the normal senses, is not able to express thoughts needs and feelings or processes information differently adaptations are necessary. Yet, often these students are at risk for an inappropriate referral because they are different from mainstream American culture and special educators often confuse disability with diversity because of inadequate preparation to teach multicultural students (Flexer, Baer, Luft, & Simmons, 2013, p. 48). To plan the transition for these students into adulthood team members should have a comprehensive description of each student's family and solicit in a cultural and supportive manner family input in order to establish a vision of how the family sees their child's adult life. Students themselves can negotiate between family and team members about their future goals. All parties have to find a culturally responsive way to make the transition for the student as smooth as

There are many factors that play a role in the learning process for every human being. Race, religion, language, socioeconomics, gender, family structure, and disabilities can all affect the ways in which we learn. Educators must take special measures in the delivery of classroom instruction to celebrate the learning and cultural differences of each of their students. As communities and schools continue to grow in diversity, teachers are searching for effective educational programs to accommodate the various learning styles of each student while promoting acceptance of cultural differences throughout the classroom. It no longer suffices to plan educational experiences only for middle-or upper class white learners and then