- Provide the students with an open-ended question. Demonstrate a scientific concept at the beginning of the lesson. Have students brainstorm why they witnessed something happen or provide potential answers to the open-ended question. Do not correct the students if they provide an incorrect answer; guide their thinking through active questioning. Break the students up into lab groups and require them to work together to design an experiment that could test the scientific concept. Provide students with the materials to perform the student-constructed experiment. Maintain order in the classroom during investigations, paying particular attention that safety procedures are followed. Circulate during the experiment, asking questions to make sure that the students are on the right track. Encourage the students to collaborate to find the solution to the problem. Regroup as a class to discuss findings. Use sufficient wait time when asking a question. Gather information from each group and refine questions as needed. Note all discoveries and present any solutions found during the exercise. Draw conclusions from data and observations. Perform additional inquiries as needed.
- Act as a facilitator or guide in the classroom. As stated, resist the urge to correct the students, but use questioning techniques to guide the students to the correct answers. While structured scientific inquiry, or a traditional lab experiment, is beneficial to the classroom, it offers little development of problem-solving skills. Use guided inquiry or open inquiry in the classroom to develop higher level thinking skills. In guided inquiry, the teacher provides the students with a problem and tools that they can use to solve the problem. In open inquiry, the students determine the problem and devise an investigation to solve the problem.
