​Instructional models are useful because they can create a predictable rhythm for you and your students. Lesson types establish a rhythm across a unit, while classroom routines create daily rhythm.

 

Whether you have used the 5E model or not, Anchored Inquiry Learning will feel familiar and different. You can expect students in your classroom to:

• Spend extended time deeply investigating phenomena, with units targeting larger standards bundles and requiring more time.

• Drive much of their learning experience, through their questions about and ideas about phenomena.

• Share and revise their models and explanations through iterative sensemaking discussions that make their thinking visible.

• Work together in a community to figure out science ideas through argumentation and other collaborative sensemaking activities.

• Continuously reflect on where they've been, where they're going next, and why.

• Engage with science practices continuously and flexibly throughout a unit to "figure out" concepts and to explain phenomena or design solutions.

 

Sound exciting? We think so, too. Learn more about the BSCS Anchored Inquiry Learning model. Find resources for designing lessons using this instructional model in the Design Tools section.