This is the seventh and final article about the Inquiry Learning Plan (ILP). It focuses on assessment and the final product, called the “So What?” See Figure 1.

Fig. 1. So What? The Outcomes.

RUBRIC BASED ASSESSMENT

In a typical ILP unit, students do three rounds of activities and reflections to practice their skills and answer their essential question(s). Students benefit from formative feedback during the earlier rounds of activities because only the final round of activities receives a summative grade, which is based on rubrics that students create. The ILP itself also receives a summative grade that is based on a rubric with the following categories:

• Standards: measures the skill level and alignment of activities to the language of standards
• Reflection: measures ability to synthesize texts and use specific details and real-world context to answer their essential question
• Questions: measures the effectiveness of both essential and guiding questions and the student’s initiative in developing and refining them throughout the process
• Learning Activities: measures the progression and connection to inquiry and the final assessment
• Work Ethic: measures engagement, level of challenge, and willingness to share their learning with others
• Information Search Process* (ISP) and Inquiry: measures ability to use feedback, overcome obstacles, solve problems, and use sources ethically

The rubric uses AASL’s Standards for the 21st-Century Learner, and each of the categories is tied to specific standards so students can see the direct connections. To see the entire Inquiry Learning Plan rubric, visit the Let Go To Learn blog (http://letgotolearn.com/ilp).

The ILP provides a transparent learning experience for students and teachers. From the beginning, students are exposed to the standards they are asked to practice and master; teachers are privy to the thoughts of students through reflections, as students articulate their learning process. And, both the teacher and the student understand that the process, as much as the product, is significant.

Though reflection is sometimes viewed as a skill that is only graded formatively, we believe it is essential to assess so we include it in the rubric. The following is our description for Advanced Proficiency in this category: “student uses reflections to synthesize texts by using specific details from the works and real-world content to create an original argument in response to the essential question.” By having this description in the rubric, we show that reflection is an equal part in the learning process and explain the criteria for writing a successful reflection. This, however, is not the only reason for our emphasis on reflection. Because the “So What?” serves as a culmination of students’ work, both the essential question reflections and the standard reflections serve as inspiration and, in some ways, justification for the decision of their final “So What” product.

When they reach this stage, it is a point for students to consider all that they have learned about their questions, how they have progressed in their skills, and what they now understand about themselves and their world. They then create a product for a specific audience, which demonstrates their greatest take-aways from the unit. Because the product encapsulates their learning over the course of their inquiry study, it receives a summative grade.

SO WHAT?

The “So What?” is especially unique because it reaches beyond the classroom. Unlike many class projects, students select an authentic audience for their message, and then develop a product geared toward the needs of that audience. Students move away from the familiar mediums they are comfortable with or in which they are already accomplished.

This thought process is recorded in a rationale that explains the students’ thinking behind the “So What?” product. Students will generally have at least one of three approaches as the crux of their take-away: (1) an answer to their essential question, (2) a skill they mastered, and (3) what they learned about themselves.

In their rationale, they explain why this is the greatest lesson of the unit and how the texts, activities, or other experiences shaped it. For example, a sophomore student attempted to answer the EQ, “Is our future in our control?” In this unit, she read Macbeth and True Notebooks: A Writer’s Year at Juvenile Hall by Mark Salzman. Both of these texts, one fiction and one nonfiction, centered on individuals who made dangerous choices that affected their futures. In summarizing what she gained from these texts, she wrote, “From these two books I’ve learned that to every decision there are two sides, but [it’s] up to the person on which side you choose to follow through with.” Most students’ take-aways are related to their EQ.

After students have explained the development of their greatest takeaway, they provide reasons for why their chosen authentic audience would benefit from the same lesson. The student described previously decided to write a story for grade schoolers in order to help them understand that growing up is a fun adventure. Her story was about a little boy who hated birthdays because he was afraid of growing older; with the help of a spirit who showed him the future, he learned that his future was in his control and that he should not be afraid if he made good decisions.

For those students who decide to focus their “So What?” on a skill, they should think about how they might employ that skill for a real audience by teaching the skill or using it to reach an appropriate objective. For instance, one student wrote a letter to the superintendent about school policy changes after she learned how to write a strong argument by considering the opposing perspective and the audience’s concerns. If students choose to focus on something they learned about themselves, they might reach out to other students who are in need of that particular skill; for example, a high school student might reach out to middle schoolers who could benefit from learning about perseverance when they are frustrated with their homework.

SCHOOL LIBRARIANS CAN HELP

If students struggle with finding a suitable audience, it is an excellent opportunity to invite the school librarian into the class; she can help students research individuals and groups outside of the school. Part of reaching out to a real audience is knowing the needs of that audience and the best way to address them. If a student is preparing a presentation for a local township committee, she will need to research the committee and the members to determine how to get her point across to them. School librarians can also help as students search for presentation tools to share their learning; the librarians at Hunterdon Central have Libguides devoted to these tools so that students can access them from school and home.

All of these aspects—the rationale, the audience, and the product are equally important and require careful thought, which is why they are all in the rubric. The “So What?” Rubric, also published in The New Jersey English Journal (2014), is grounded in standards from the American Association of School Librarians, from the National Council of Teachers of English, and from the Common Core State Standards. See Figure 2. It is broken into four traits: ideas, organization, conventions, and audience and purpose. These traits are purposefully left somewhat broad. Since students can choose the medium as well as the content for their final product, the scoring system must be flexible enough to fairly grade diverse projects. We do this by focusing on the ways in which a student presents his ideas and how he goes about addressing the needs of his audience.

SUMMARY

Throughout the last seven articles, we’ve detailed a learning experience that calls upon students to think critically about what they are learning, how they are learning, and what all that learning means. Essentially, the ILP is the answer to the content versus skill debate; with the ILP, one does not have to sacrifice one for the other. There is a certain educational maturity that this process calls for and it doesn’t necessarily ask students to have that maturity at the onset. To develop such self-awareness and ownership of one’s learning takes time and practice, and the ILP, along with a collaborative classroom environment supported by teachers and school librarians, helps students achieve educational goals and standards as well as the habits of a lifelong learner.

If you are interested in trying the ILP with your students or in your classroom or school, don’t feel like you have to go at it alone. We would love to be in your learning community to offer support, celebrate achievements, and help you through any challenges. If you are interested but not quite ready to implement the process with your students, check out our blog at letgotolearn.com/ for best practices, resources, and other musings on teaching and learning with inquiry.

* For more information on the Information Search Process, see Kuhlthau, Carol. “Information Search Process.” Carol Collier Kuhlthau. Last modified October 2013. https://comminfo.rutgers.edu/~kuhlthau/information_search_process.htm.