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Guided Inquiry Laboratory

Peggy Geiger - under construction

Description

Guided inquiry labs are appropriate for laboratory science courses. The purpose of guided inquiry labs is to provide students structured experience with scientific inquiry. The focus of laboratory activity is shifted from confirming a concept to collecting data and developing the desired concept (POGIL, n. d.).

Igelsrud and Leonard (1988, p. 305) identify four components of guided inquiry labs.

Introduction. A brief introduction provides the context of the experiment in relation to the course and states the goals of the experiment (Igelsrud and Leonard, 1988, p. 305). POGIL (n. d.) (Process Oriented Guided Inquiry Learning) guidelines require that a guided inquiry experiment start with a question. The introductory material should not introduce the concepts to be explored in the experiment (Allen, Barker, and Ramsden, 1986).

Materials. The students are given a list of available materials (Igelsrud and Leonard, 1988, p. 305).

Procedure. In the most structured form of guided inquiry, a stepwise procedure is given. Sufficient direction should be provided while avoiding so much detail that the students get bogged down. The experiment should included skills such as identifying variables, controlling variables, and quantifying data (Inglesrud and Leonard, 1988, p. 305). Less procedural detail encourages students to think about how the data will be collected and analyzed (Allen, Barker, and Ramsden, 1986).

Discussion. Carefully constructed questions lead the students through data review and analysis, then graphing, inferring, and concluding. Additional questions explicitly guide students to the development of the desired scientific concepts (Inglesrud and Leonard, 1988, p. 305). It is important that students verify their analysis and conclusions about the key concept (Allen, Barker, and Ramsden, 1986). The final questions encourage application of the developed concept (POGIL, n. d.)

Allen, Barker, and Ramsden (1986) provide a template for converting experiments to guided inquiry activites and recommend criteria for selecting experiments. The experiments should:

• Involve simple and straightforward concepts
• Collect data using uncomplicated apparatus
• Provide data suitable for determination of quantitative relationships
• Test conclusions from the analysis

Major Concepts

Guided inquiry laboratory activities stem from a constructivist approach to science education which spans the range from elementary to adult education. From the perspective of science education, instructors must understand and incorporate three key principles of learning (Donovan and Brasford, 2005, pp. 1-2 and Bransford and Donovan, 2005, 399-411):

• Students’ preconceptions must be addressed before grasping and understanding new information.

• To learn science, students must understand what it means to “do science,” by engaging in scientific inquiry which involves observation, reason, and experiment.

• Engaging students in metacognition “helps them control their own learning by defining learning goals and monitoring progress in achieving them” (Donovan and Brasford, 2005, p. 2).

The guided inquiry approach recognizes that many learners either have not achieved or do not normally operate at a formal operational level of thought required to understand scientific concepts. The guided inquiry approach can promote the development of abstract thought via manipulative laboratory activities and by using formal reasoning strategies to provide structure for these activities (Igelsrud and Leonard, 1988, p. 306).

Additionally, guided inquiry laboratories promote the development of key scientific process skills (Igelsrud and Leonard, 1988, p. 306):

• Handling quantitative relationships
• Accessing and explaining data
• Conceptualizing and planning investigations
• Summarizing results
• Interpreting and concluding
• Selecting form of presenting findings
• Designing experiments

From the perspective of adult education, the strategy of guided inquiry laboratories resides within the constructivist model of experiential learning. This strategy is build upon the four stage learning cycle of concrete experience, observations and reflections, formation of abstract concepts and generalization, and testing implications of concepts in new situations (Kolb, 1984, p. 21). Guided inquiry laboratory activities attempt to provide a structure which promotes experiential learning.

Four different types of laboratory instruction have been identified: expository (“cook book”), open-inquiry, discovery (guided inquiry) and problem based. The distinguishing factors are outcome, approach, and procedure. According to this classification, guided inquiry labs have an outcome known by the instructor, but unknown by the students; the approach is inductive and the procedure is given (Domin, 1999, p. 543). In reality, guided inquiry and open inquiry laboratory activities span a range from highly structured to open ended. For example, the guidelines developed for guided inquiry labs (POGIL, n.d.) recommend that instructors allow student input on the design of experiments. The less detail provided in the procedures, the more “open” ended the activity.

Relationship to Teaching Perspective

The strategy of guided inquiry laboratory activities fits best with the developmental teaching perspective. According to this perspective, learners come to understand concepts by constructing their own internal representations (Arseneau and Rodenburg, 1998, pp. 110-111).

Guided inquiry laboratory activities are consistent with the principles of the developmental perspective outlined by Arseneau and Rodenburg (1998, pp. 113-134). In examining the role of prior knowledge, most students in introductory science courses are in alien territory. In accordance with the “less is more” advice offered by by Arseneau and Rodenburg (1998, pp. 113), it is important to limit the activity to one simple concept. Students usually have some prior knowledge (not necessarily correct) about the natural and physical world. A few written pre-lab questions or a pre-lab discussion allows students to activate prior knowledge and provides feedback to the instructor about their prior knowledge. For example, before an activity examining density, it would be appropriate to ask students about what volume means, how it is measured, and what units are used to express volume.

The principle that learners must be actively involved in constructing personal meaning is at the core of guided inquiry laboratory activities. It is important that these activities are designed so that students learn the content by actively engaging in scientific inquiry involving observation, imagination, and reasoning. Tools and procedures are not ends in themselves, but devices to promote new insights (Bransford and Donovan, 2005, p. 405).

Making more and stronger knowledge links is promoted in guided inquiry laboratory activities when students are given opportunities to apply the concepts uncovered by the activity in a new context. For example, after developing the empirical relationship between freezing point depression and concentration, students are asked to use this relationship to determine the molecular weight of an unknown solid (Allen, Barker, and Ramsden, 1986).

A further “in context” activity could reinforce understanding of the concept. For example, a POGIL (process oriented guided inquiry learning) activity developed to investigate why beer freezes in a home refrigerator while whiskey does not provides further application of the relationship between freezing point and solution concentration (Cheatham and Geiger, 2007). This type of approach addresses the principle that context provides important cues for storing and retrieving information (Arseneau and Rodenburg 1998, pp. 112).

The intrinsic motivation associated with deep learning is more likely to be activated using a guided inquiry approach than with a standard expository lab. This is especially true if the labs are designed around puzzling or interesting situations (Igelsrud and Leonard, 1988, p. 305).

The last principle, that teaching should be geared toward making the teacher increasingly unnecessary, is more difficult to address in a single guided inquiry lab activity. To the extent that the activity promotes formal reasoning and encourages students to reflect upon their own learning, the students are provided with an opportunity to develop both intellect (formal operational reasoning) and learning autonomy.

Benefits

The guided inquiry approach to laboratory instruction offers a middle ground between open inquiry and structured expository labs. While open ended inquiry most resembles scientific research, it can be challenging to implement this approach. At the other extreme, expository labs are well defined and easy to implement, but are routine.

The appeal of the guided inquiry approach to laboratory instruction is that better models scientific processes and skills than expository labs. The intent of this approach is to make the laboratory experience more meaningful for students and improve retention of information (Domin, 1999, p.545). Additionally, guided inquiry approaches offer potential to improve student confidence and attitudes about science.

Relatively few controlled studies have studied the effect of guided inquiry labs on student learning. According to Domin (1999, p. 546), evidence exists that nontraditional laboratory instruction improves student cognitive learning in the physical sciences, but that studies focused on chemistry show no effect of guided inquiry laboratory instruction on student achievement.

Considerable educational research has focused on biology laboratory instruction, generally comparing traditional expository labs with inquiry approaches (Igelsrud and Leonard, 1988). In summarizing the literature, Igelsrud and Leonard conclude that the newer approaches, student involved and more inductive, generally produced greater educational gains than more traditional approaches. The newer approaches work in both secondary and higher educational settings and with a variety of levels of students (not just the academically talented).

More recently, a small study comparing expository and open inquiry biology labs (Russell and French, 2002) concluded that the relationship between improved student achievement and active lab participation was stronger in the open inquiry labs. Additionally, gender differences in lab participation were reduced with open inquiry labs. (In mixed gender lab groups, men tend to perform more of the “hands-on” activities than women do. I remember arguing with my male physics lab partners to allow me to touch the equipment.)

Drawbacks and Cautions

One disadvantage of guided inquiry laboratory instruction is that the experiments and follow up generally require more time than for traditional expository labs. Another drawback is that students may not “discover” the desired principle, requiring the instructor to provide the information and defeating the purpose of the inquiry activity (Domin, 1999, p. 545). The guided inquiry lab approach lends itself to allowing students to discover scientific concepts, but is less adaptable to promoting problem solving skills (Igelsrud and Leonard, 1988, p. 306).

Using a guided inquiry approach does not necessarily address issues that arise in laboratory courses such as unequal participation and contribution of lab partners or students rushing though the experiment so that they can leave early.

Because guided inquiry labs are less structured than traditional expository labs, students may experience frustration when they have to think about the procedure and what data they need to collect and why they need to collect it. They are likely to find the data analysis more “difficult” than what they have encountered in expository labs. If the experiment does not go according to plan, it may have to be repeated to get usable results.

Bransford and Donovan (2005, p. 405) warn against using lockstep approaches to inquiry which provide carefully constructed procedures and steps for students to follow. The result is often that students lose sight of the question they are investigating and the reasoning that leads to understanding the key concept demonstrated by the experiment remains unclear.

Final Thoughts

I have shied away from the guided inquiry approach in introductory laboratories. Students in my classes often have little or no prior chemistry laboratory experience. For safety and instructor sanity, the easiest approach seems to be a highly controlled and structured laboratory experience. Lab activities such as simple qualitative analysis tax students’ reasoning abilities and they easily get off track. With a class of 20 or 24 students, I don’t always catch the students before they have missed the point.

Yet, the “cookbook” lab exercises can be boring and students still fail to make the desired connections between the lab and key concepts. Permitting more latitude in the experiments makes them more interesting for students (and the instructor) and often highlights misunderstandings. In a recent inquiry lab activity, my students realized that using a graduated cylinder to measure the volume of water displaced by one penny, they could not get a reliable measurement. Suddenly, they began to understand what precision in measurement means and how it is related to how data is reported.

As with any new method implementation, it is important to carefully plan the activity and to determine the desired outcomes and how best to achieve and assess them. Working through the details of data analysis will highlight potential difficulties. (For example, I knew I was in trouble when I had to ask my son to review natural logarithms for me.) Even when using a published activity, it is unlikely that the first attempt will result in an ideal implementation and notes should be made about what might be improved when the activity is repeated.

I definitely plan to repeat the guided inquiry lab activity I used this semester and am considering incorporating additional guided inquiry lab activities. The activity gave me an opportunity to teach from the “core” of my discipline of chemistry and I have enjoyed it. Colleagues in the department tell me that my students are talking excitedly about this lab activity in their other courses

References

Allen, J. B., Barker, L. N., & Ramsden, J. H. (1986). Guided inquiry laboratory. Journal of chemical education, 63(6), 533-534.

Bransford, J. D., & Donovan, M. S. (2005). Scientific inquiry and how people learn. In How students learn: Science in the classroom (chap. 9), Washington, D. C.:National Academies Press, pp. 397-420. Retrieved March 24, 2007, from http://books.nap.edu/nap-cgi/skimit.cgi?recid=11102&chap=27-52.

Cheatham, T., and Geiger, M. W. (2007). Whiskey for my men, beer for my horses. Unpublished POGIL activity.

Domin, D. (1999). A review of laboratory instruction styles. Journal of chemical education, 76 (4), 543-547.

Donovan, M. S., & Bransford, J. D. (2005). Introduction. In How students learn: Science in the classroom (chap. 9), Washington, D. C.:National Academies Press, pp. 1-26. Retrieved March 24, 2007, from http://books.nap.edu/nap-cgi/skimit.cgi?recid=11102&chap=27-52.

Igelsrud, D., & Leonard, W. H. (1988). Labs: What research says about biology lab instruction. The American biology teacher, 50 (5), 303-306.

Kolb, D. A. (1984). Process of experiential learning (chapter 2) in Experiential learning. New Jersey: Prentic Hall, pp. 20-38.

POGIL (n.d.). Criteria for guided inquiry labs. Retrieved March 19, 2007, from http://www.pogil.org/materials/labs.php

Russell, C. P., & French, D. P. (2002). Factors affecting participation in traditional and inquiry-based laboratories. Journal of college science teaching, 31 (4), 225-229.