This week our class went on a field trip to Pacific School of Innovation and Inquiry (PSII).  Unfortunately I was unable to make the field trip due to having to stay home with a sick child, but I was able to go on to their website and learn about their approaches, as well as watch a TED Talk done by Jeff Hopkins who founded PSII.  I really connected with a quote that Jeff began his TED Talk with which was, “Education is not the filling of a pail,  but rather the lighting of a flame.”  This is such a powerful statement that I think really sets the tone of PSII and their educational philosophy.

After listening to the TED Talk, and exploring the PSII website a bit, I find that I am intrigued to learn more about their approach to education.  While there is definitely a focus on inquiry based learning in the new BC curriculum, and we have talked a little bit about it in our program, PSII has taken it to the next level.  Some areas that stand out about how PSII is different than regular public school in their approaches are:  the different subjects are integrated rather than taught separately, teachers and learners work together to come up with learning plans, students personal interests are central to the whole experience, and students are grouped in whatever way makes most sense and the groupings are dynamic.  From the bit that I have learned about PSII and their approach to education, it seems like they are putting into action an ideal learning environment.

For all the positives that PSII appears to bring to education, I believe that this kind of learning environment would only truly succeed in specific situations.  I think it would be extremely difficult to apply PSIIs’ approaches in a regular public school.  In a regular school setting,  to be able to give students this much freedom with the curriculum, and to create completely individual learning plans for each student, it would be very difficult.  I also think that for younger students (mainly elementary) this much freedom and inquiry would be difficult.  Inquiry based learning is important and teaches students many added skills, but for younger learners I think they still need a higher level of guidance from the teacher as they learn how to successfully approach this kind of learning.  Maybe in the future, as education keeps adapting and shifting, there will come a time where more schools can successfully approach education in a similar way as PSII.  For now, I think finding a balance where teachers can challenge and guide students to more inquiry based learning, while still fitting in the confines of BC curriculum, is a good place to start.

This is a link to an article that looks at some of the benefits and challenges of inquiry based learning:

https://www.kqed.org/mindshift/29714/the-challenges-and-realities-of-inquiry-based-learning