{"id":868,"date":"2017-04-17T09:43:37","date_gmt":"2017-04-17T13:43:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/blog\/waterinquiry\/?p=868"},"modified":"2020-01-02T09:06:41","modified_gmt":"2020-01-02T14:06:41","slug":"a-rainy-day-adventure-theory-into-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/ducklings\/a-rainy-day-adventure-theory-into-practice\/","title":{"rendered":"A Rainy Day Adventure: Theory into Practice"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Katy Butler reads “Inquiry Inc and the Case of the Missing Ducklings” at the Water Story Teacher Workshop.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A heavy April downpour set the perfect tone for our first Water Inquiry Story Workshop, held in the Design Thinking Lab of Smith College. Skilled educators from four elementary schools cast dripping umbrellas aside before digging into the learning adventures of Inquiry Inc. and the Case of the Missing<\/i> Ducklings<\/em>, our newly published storybook.<\/i>\u00a0Pilot teacher Katy Butler introduced the interactive\u00a0text as she did with her first graders, saying: \u201cIt\u2019s a picture book story with characters… the kind of story where we will stop and talk, stop and think, stop and go. You will get to do the activities.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Teachers Jan Szymaszek, 3rd Grade Smith Campus School and Renee Bachman, 3rd Grade Leeds Elementary School, sketch their ideas about where the ducklings will go.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Teachers then had the opportunity to immerse themselves in the student mindset,\u00a0studying images of storm drains and ducklings, discussing the questions: \u201cWhere do you think the water goes?\u201d and \u201cWhere will the ducklings go?\u201d before working together to show their ideas about drain design and water pathways. In his new book Wait, What? And Life’s Other Essential Questions, <\/em>James E. Ryan– Dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education– writes that, \u201cInquiry… should always precede advocacy,\u201d and it was, indeed, this sense of participatory\u00a0engagement that characterized teachers’ efforts to “think… talk… and go” in preparation for doing so with their students.<\/p>\n

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Illustration by Zoe Dong and Sarah White: story characters investigate how to rescue ducklings from the storm drain.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Opportunities for experimentation and exploration revealed the combined powers of STEM and story. \u201cI love the pauses and premise of the problem\u201d one educator noted, while another shared: “… there is so much that can benefit student writing. It will be powerful for [my students] to have the experience of doing the story activities…\u00a0it will greatly help their reading and writing.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Renee Bachman, 3rd grade Leeds Elementary and Margaret Betts, 1st grade Maple Elementary, envision how they will use the story in their classrooms.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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The connective power of this Water Inquiry story was revealed, not only through educators\u2019 energetic collaboration, but through the discussion of relational possibilities between the story and math\u00a0or reading practices, engineering games, field trips– even\u00a0fundraisers to\u00a0support organizations that provide clean water in Haiti.\u00a0Teachers discussed ways to use the story as a complement to inquiries unique to their classrooms, noting\u00a0interests in\u00a0environmental activism and the strengthening of\u00a0connections to their local and global communities.<\/p>\n

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Allyson Ciccarone (’17), four-year water inquiry researcher, and Jan Szymaszek, share ideas and questions.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Inspired to\u00a0revise their initial answers about the path of water (and fate of ducklings!), educators\u00a0left\u00a0the workshop with answers, ideas, and– most importantly– new questions with which to guide and challenge their students. With copies of the Water Inquiry picture book and activities binder in hand, they left the workshop with a new perspective of the world beneath their rain boots.<\/p>\n

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If you, too, would like to pilot Inquiry Inc. and the Case of the Missing Ducklings <\/i>in your classroom, please contact Carol Berner at cberner@smith.edu<\/a>. And, as always, stay tuned for more Water Inquiry updates. The fun has just begun!<\/p>\n

Sincerely,
\nBrittany Collins writing for the Water Inquiry Story Group<\/p>\n

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Problem-solving jingle of Inquiry Inc. characters<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Katy Butler
\nAllyson Ciccarone
\nBrittany Collins
\nZoe Dong
\nMeghan Johnson
\nRuth Neils
\nHannah Searles
\nSarah White
\nAnna Wysocki
\nCarol Berner & Al Rudnitsky<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A heavy April downpour set the perfect tone for our first Water Inquiry Story Workshop, held in the Design Thinking Lab of Smith College. Skilled educators from four elementary schools cast dripping umbrellas aside before digging into the learning adventures of Inquiry Inc. and the Case of the Missing Ducklings, our newly published storybook.\u00a0Pilot teacher … Continue reading A Rainy Day Adventure: Theory into Practice<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":735,"featured_media":872,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-868","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ducklings"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/485\/2017\/04\/Jan-Renee.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/735"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=868"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1583,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868\/revisions\/1583"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=868"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=868"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/waterinquiry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=868"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}