Blog Post #3-Inquiry Celebration Reflection

As a tutor last year, I do not believe I fully understood the reason why interns were participating in this research; I left the celebration feeling overwhelmed and confused. Interestingly enough, I had almost the complete opposite reaction to the Inquiry presentations. I found myself feeling eager during every presentation to find out the results of each interns study. I truly wanted to know if their research question showed any interesting data and results. It almost felt like a light bulb clicked when I realized as a participant I was doing a mini version of this for my Education 600 class. This year I decided to attend two intern sessions both dealing with mathematics. I felt this would be most beneficial for me since this is one subject I struggle to teach. One thing I learned from many of these presentations was the effectiveness of math work stations. Many Interns found that these stations were a fun and helpful way for students to learn math. This would definitely be something I would use in my classroom. One presentation I found extremely interesting was based around teaching math lessons around the three types of learners. This Intern taught a lesson a day in a different learning style. Her results were quite interesting; she found that the kinesthetic was the least effective way for students to learn. This intern noticed that students were more focused on playing with the materials rather than learning the concepts. Overall, I believe the Inquiry Celebration as a Participant was extremely helpful and interesting. After leaving the Inquiry Celebration this year at Lakeview Resort, I can honestly say I feel extremely excited for the upcoming year.