Recently, it seems that "inquiry-type learning" is being emphasized.It will be carried out at the school of all the high school students who are readers.I'm not familiar with it, but is it the spillover effect of the Super Science High School (SSH) system?It is said to be a series of research-like activities in which students find an issue, exchange opinions about it, discuss answers, and make presentations.I think this is fine.It will be a good training to research, summarize and present based on each interest and awareness of the problem.

　On the other hand, it can be anxious.Is this really an "inquiry"?

　It is a "survey" to target something, investigate it, and summarize it.You can find most things by searching books, pictorial books, or the Internet in the library.Whether you introduce the technique of experimentation or observation, or the teacher is involved as a facilitator rather than a teacher, it will be effective in learning "how" such as how to investigate, discuss, and present.However, if it stays at this, it seems better to define it as "survey-type learning".Of course, I think that research-based learning also has great meaning and can produce reliable results, but as long as the word inquiry is used, I hope that it is inquiry.

　So what is the difference between research and inquiry?It will be "deep or not" as the word "inquiry" reminds us.After a little research, it was found that it is important to think about concepts in true inquiry-based learning.For example, when studying the depiction of a person in a literary work, it is important not only to understand it from multiple angles, but also to raise the level of abstraction of the discussion, such as what literature is in the first place. That is.It seems that the research type and the inquiry type are different in that respect.I agree with this, but I still feel that it isn't enough.Conceptualization is still different from "inquiry".Thinking about individual issues up to the concept is just a conceptualization of the argument as the level of abstraction has increased, and it may be different from "deepening".

　Then, when I say "what is the inquiry", I want to "find my own question deeply".In general, if you want to know something or find out the essence of things, the knowledge you gain will become more and more detailed.But this is not the essence.Rather than saying that the knowledge becomes more detailed, the questions call for questions, and the questions are steadily approaching the root ... The fundamental question is, after all, why I exist, my life and death. It's like connecting to.I think that it is not until we reach such an area that we can call it inquiry.

　Inquiry in that sense is impossible in junior high school and high school!I think I can hear the voice.However, I think that thinking that way is an important flaw in the current inquiry-based learning.Real quest ... Thinking in that area is not something you have to spend your life for many years, nor do you have to think hard enough to get crowded.It's like my second son, now four years old, is always asking me, "Dad, who made the universe?"

　After all, whether it's research-based learning, inquiry-based learning, or everyday lessons, everything that goes into these fundamental areas, or stubbornness and its universality ( There is no point in learning unless you can think of (= the mercy of things).As a human being who will die eventually, nothing is more important and practical than thinking about life (= existence). "Learning" is essentially that kind of thing, and "learning" is just "living."Even if school lessons or studies tend to be memorized for the exam, what you are trying to memorize now is actually connected to you and the existence of the world, just like another self staring at you. If you can feel that you are doing it, then it is a wonderful learning of a lifetime.

　Last but not least, what do you do if your daily lessons are not so?It is more important and practical to change our daily lives than to do something special under the name of inquiry-based learning.Teachers should do their best so that all daily lectures are truly inquiry, or at least a little inquiring spirit, and learners are also such teachers: score earners and efficient memorization. I think it's better to praise a teacher who makes you feel what life is like, not a teacher who is good at teaching the technique of.