How can we create a classroom filled with curiosity? One of the teaching practices that had the most bang for my buck was creating a “Wonder Wall” and instilling a culture of questioning in my classroom. When we encourage children to ask questions, and inquire about the world around them, we are creating life long learners. We are also empowering our students to seek answers for themselves, taking ownership over their learning and isn’t this our ultimate end goal as teachers?
Here’s a quick list of some ideas/practices that will take your classroom from a place where you control the learning and questioning to a place where the students are constructing their own learning (and you may be learning right along with them)!
1. Create a Wonder Wall
I wish I had a picture of my Wonder Wall from my last classroom (I am searching high and low!). Basically you make a Wonder Wall using wall space, white board space or a bulletin board to create an area for students to put their wonders (I used sticky notes to write wonders on, but if on white board or dry erase bulletin board paper you could use dry erase markers, too).
Allowing students to record their wonders not only helps stop shouting out and interrupting your lessons (AMEN!) but also creates a great place to store wonders for future units, or discussions or even early finisher work. My students loved researching our wonders in their free time, and sharing what they found at our closing meetings.
BONUSL This bulletin board was a class favorite and it can stay up all year!
2. Wonder of the Day
As part of our morning routine each day we would preview a Wonder of the Day-some came from the Wonderopolis website. If you don’t know this website you need to check it out ASAP-it’s a game changer! The students would do a ‘Think, Pair, Share’ with their hypotheses and then we would do a quick share out.
We would find out the answer at the end of the day during our closing meeting but often the Wonder of the Day would spark debate and discussion throughout the day, often leading to more wonders being put on our Wonder Wall.
During closing meeting we would find out the answer to our wonder and discuss whether we were correct or not-discussing how often scientists aren’t correct and that is OK! (growth mindset anyone?!)
I have to share one quick story about a Wonder of the Day we had when I was teaching in London. It was this wonder HERE: “Can anything live forever?” Most children said no, that everything has a life cycle and nothing can life forever. One of my students, however, piped up and said “The Immortal Jellyfish lives forever”. All my students turned to me to see if he was right- but I didn’t know because I try not to look at the answers and be surprised along with my class. So, I said, “I have no idea, but we will find out this afternoon!” I have to admit, I thought, there is no way that the Immortal Jellyfish is a real thing….Sure enough, at closing meeting, we found out that he was indeed correct and all of our minds were blown!
3. iTime Journals/Projects
Last tip for promoting questioning and inquiry in your classroom is giving some time for iTime (inquiry time). I heard about this first from Kath Murdoch, an inquiry guru from Australia. She’s amazing, you should follow her!
iTime could look different in every class-but its time for students to do their own inquiries. In my classroom, we had time on Friday afternoons for iTime. Some students were researching facts about a topic of interest (animals, places, landforms etc…) and creating presentations, while others spent their time learning how to do something (crochet, carve soap, make guitars out of cereal boxes). For the most part, I never vetoed an iTime project, but I did need to approve them to make sure they were appropriate but could also be completed at school!
My students loved iTime! The felt empowered, taking ownership over their learning and developing independence along the way!
Make your classroom a place where curiosity is cultivated and our students minds can thrive!
