Moving from Levels of Inquiry to the Flexible Phases of Inquiry Theory: A Literature Review of Inquiry-Based Teacher Education

Year 2021, Volume: 10 Issue: 2, 255 - 271, 31.08.2021

Julie Bacak Erik Byker

Abstract

The purpose of our article is to examine the phases of inquiry-based learning and how to best prepare future teachers for inquiry-based teaching. While preservice teachers (PST) may leave teacher preparation with an understanding of the tenets of inquiry, their experiences in methods courses and experiences teaching in the field do not adequately prepare them to implement inquiry-based learning in classroom instruction. Part of this problem of practice relates to how the process of inquiry is ill-defined and muddy (Authors, 2020). To investigate this problem of practice, we use a literature review methodology in order to examine and compare how teacher candidates are prepared with inquiry-based methods. We used Banchi and Bell’s (2008) Levels of Inquiry as a lens for reporting on different levels of inquiry-based preparation of teacher candidates. This lens was informative, though ultimately too restricting. We found that the types and degrees of inquiry-based teacher preparation vary greatly from context to context. This variation inspired our design of the Flexible Phases of Inquiry model. The Flexible Phases of Inquiry Theory is a framework to support educators’ understanding of how the levels of inquiry are not fixed, but rather overlapping and dynamic.

Keywords

Flexible Phases of Inquiry Theory, inquiry-based learning, inquiry-based teaching, levels of inquiry, teacher education

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