Students learned to perform first-person presentation to display information researched through an inquiry process. Teachers helped students learn inquiry during instructional time. Teachers, parents, and guardians worked together to support student learning in a high poverty and low educational attainment Appalachian community. The character the…

Four newly released peer-reviewed research studies show that using rigorous project-based learning in U.S. public schools has strong and positive effects on student outcomes across grades and subjects. Project-based learning (PBL) is an inquiry-based approach in which students explore real-world problems through individual and group projects. With…

The Socio-Critical Assessment Integration Framework (SCAIF) and its consequences for social studies education are examined in this study. The results emphasize the advantages of developing inclusive learning environments, encouraging comprehensive evaluation procedures, encouraging applicability to the real world, and giving students agency by…

Students used inquiry to invest folklore in their community. As part of the C3 inquiry arc students defined questions, connected folklore to a discipline, gathered data from their community and communicated information. Students' agency drove each of the projects as the students determined how much they would investigate each topic. Students…

Project-based learning (PBL) is a powerful way to make learning meaningful to students and to promote student questions and ownership of the inquiry process. It is a useful way to design and deliver curriculum that is similar in many ways to the Inquiry Design Model (IDM). Although PBL and IDM both value inquiry and student questioning, PBL…

Both the College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework and Problem Based Learning (PBL) pedagogy encourage the use of compelling and supporting questions as a central element of the teaching and learning process. Some researchers, however, assert that the ideals of constructivist PBL may fall short of intended outcomes by leaving too much at the…

Researchers have proposed integration as an approach to effectively teach social studies in primary grades. Many teachers integrate by teaching social studies content and skills during time allocated for other subjects, such as literacy, science, or math. Integration clearly uses time efficiently to allow for more social studies content. However,…

Middle school students learned about their community when they created documentaries as part of a state bicentennial celebration. Students gathered multiple primary and secondary resources and worked with community members to interview them for their perspectives through video presentations as part of the inquiry process. Students work with local…

Project-Based Learning (PBL) is increasingly popular in K-12 schools, not just in the United States but around the world. PBL is a great way to engage students in their learning. In this article, the author presents what PBL is and is not.

In this practical guide, literacy experts show teachers how to use project-based inquiry to build students' discipline-specific skills and knowledge in grades 6-12. The authors present a five-phase framework that incorporates their professional development experience working with over 3,000 teachers. By making the intuitive practices of the…

A bookmaking project in the pre-kindergarten classroom can teach a multitude of concepts related to literacy, but children can also be learning about themselves, their community, and their connections to the past when they create a book about their own personal history. Although pre-kindergarten-age students are unaware that their work could be…

New research points to the future of education as online, student-centered, collaborative, and community-based--all largely absent from today's educational landscape. This timely guide shows middle, high school, and college students how to undertake research to address challenges in their curriculum and communities. The approach is deliberately…

Recent technological advances have enhanced the accessibility of rephotography, a visual research method and project-based approach valued by social studies educators for engaging students in historical inquiry and place-based exploration. Rephotography projects capture photos from the vantage point of an old image to explore change over time.…

21st Century skills such as critical-thinking and problem-solving skills are very important when it comes to Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics or STEM. But those same skills should be integrated in social studies. The impact of students' learning in social studies as a result of implementing inquiry-based instructional strategies was…

This article describes a project that helped fourth-grade students connect personally with and bring North Carolina history to life. Over the months of this project, students asked questions, investigated topics of interest that they chose, conducted in-depth research that included interviewing experts, learned to use a video editor to combine…