Introducing inquiry-based learning in Mathematics

With our move to the International Baccalaureate Primary Years Programme, much discussion was had around how we were planning to adjust our approach to teaching Mathematics in particular. Our school has always been known for academic excellence and there was concern that as we moved to a transdisciplinary approach, the standard of our Mathematics programme would slip.

To assure our parents and other stakeholders in our learning community, we continue to use our national syllabus as a guide, and where it links authentically, Mathematics is included in the Units of Inquiry. Annual group-wide diagnostic testing is used to identify each student's needs to better inform our teaching practice, planning and implementation. This is followed with a Benchmark Test towards the end of the school year, which allows us to track and evaluate both the progress of the pupils, and the effectiveness of our teaching practice. Each student's progress is continually tracked from one year to another.

This will allow us to bide time until we familiarize our entire learning community with the IB Mathematics Scope and Sequence document and the best practice of teaching Mathematics in an inquiry-based setting as opposed to mere mechanical repetition.

So, although we continue to teach the fundamental Mathematics skills through explicit teaching, our students are also presented with inquiry-based activities to build their problem-solving skills and their experience of Mathematics in a real-world context. This added emphasis on inquiry-based Mathematics activities, both in the classroom and beyond, allows for extension well beyond the regular national curriculum.

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Central Idea: Exploration leads to discovery, and develops new understandings

In this inquiry, the Grade 6 students learnt that explorers were not limited to seafarers of old, but that scientists and mathematicians explored concepts and ideas. They also understood that discoveries of these early explorers led to many of the mathematical and scientific understandings we have today.

The Grade 6 pupils set off on their own journeys of mathematical discovery, identifying some of the most prominent mathematical explorers and considered their contribution to modern society.

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Inquiry-based Mathematics activities have been linked to the Units of Inquiry, and some have run as separate inquiries alongside the units. Students have been presented with research tasks relating to the science of Mathematics or larger mathematical problems, with multiple entry points, with the emphasis on how students arrive at an answer, as opposed to simply getting the correct answer. In fact, on many occasions more than one answer is correct.

We hope that our students would see mistakes not as a failure, but as an opportunity for growth and to continually increase in their confidence in their abilities as mathematicians.

The inquiry approach encourages students to build their Mathematics skills by incorporating the four proficiencies of: understanding, fluency, reasoning and problem solving, as opposed to purely mechanical processing.