Establishing a Culture of Inquiry during the First Days of School

I am trying to reinvent my class for next year – especially the first week of school. Here is an outline of what I did last year on the first five days of school:

1. Day 1 – Classroom expectations, basic overview of what is covered in the course
2. Day 2 – Lesson on observations, inferences, predictions, classifications, models and simulations, and communication in science
3. Day 3 – Set up science notebook
4. Day 4 – Lab safety
5. Day 5 – Measurements in science (metric system)

Now there is nothing inherently bad about the way I presented the information, but it was not entirely exciting – and it definitely was not inquiry based. I have realized that over the past few years my first week of school has been a lot about giving information. Would it not be better if students could discover this information instead?

The other thing that I want to improve is the content that I cover over the first few weeks of school. I got myself stuck in a rut of teaching students science process skills in isolation. I know that many other teachers in my school do the same. We assume that students come to us from elementary school and do not have the skills necessary to be successful in science without us laying a foundation the first week. Perhaps that is true – but I know that the science programs in our feeder schools are fantastic. Additionally, it seems these skills would be better honed through a more practical integration with the content.

I’m still in the initial planning stages of what I want to do to make the first week more inquiry focused. I also know I still do need to cover important information that sets up the classroom culture. However, I have an idea based on a lab I did several years ago and the mystery lesson strategy I learned during my gifted endorsement class.

The idea is to have rocks set out around the lab and clues also strewn around that would help students to identify the rocks. However, the clues would utilize terminology the students may not be familiar with. Also some of the clues would have information about lab tests that would need to be conducted to help in the identification process.

When students enter the classroom, they would be greeted as rock experts who have arrived just in time to help me sort out the rock mess. We would have some precursory introductions, and then we would take a look at the rocks and the clues. Over the course of the first day, students would brainstorm a list of things they need to know and do in order to solve the rock mess. We would also discuss what we would need to conduct some of the tests. This could bring in lab safety – and hopefully get students excited about getting their lab safety contracts signed in order to participate in the testing. As the week progressed, we would also discuss how to gather information and keep it organized – leading to our science notebooks.

What I’ve brainstormed so far should help introduce the lab safety, inquiry, and science notebooks. Some things it does not address are class policies, our web based portfolio project, and the class jobs I’m hoping to incorporate. I am sure I will figure out a way to address these during that first week with some more thought.

I am excited about turning my class upside down and doing something totally different. I think this will help establish a culture of inquiry, as well as curiosity and creativity, from the first day. It should also make the class more engaging and effective. As I finalize the lessons, I will be sure to share them.

What are your thoughts? Have you done anything like this before? How well did it work? What am missing? I look forward to hearing your thoughts as well!