Welcome to Ali Renwick’s Inquiry Project! I will use this website to explore the possibilities of inquiry and share my journey.
This being a living inquiry, the best place to start it is wherever one finds oneself existentially. One looks inwardly into one’s own thoughts and feelings, while facing the world, noting how one reacts with conditioned thoughts and feeling responses. Usually we are too busy reacting that we do not stop to reflect and examine our response. Inquiry starts at this point of stop. From this place of stop, we question the necessity of “the way things are,” and address the possibility of seeing the world and the self differently and hence relating to the world differently. “What if I were to…?”
—Heesoon Bai, 2005, p. 47
6 replies on “Hello :)”
Ali, this is such an important topic that does not get the attention it deserves in schools. I can totally relate to the siloed approach to health and wellness in the PHE curriculum – I remember it used to be a 2-week unit in our middle school when the gym wasn’t available during the winter!
I really appreciated how you incorporated Indigenous knowledge into your topic, and compared Maslow’s triangle to the Blackfoot Nation’s belief around the tipi. It really puts into perspective what we prioritize through different lenses. It might be worth exploring (I think I shared this during your lesson demonstration) the Okanagan-Syilx concept of “en’owkin wix” which is is based on the idea that “everyone in the community has different viewpoints, ideas, concerns, knowledge, and passions. This approach considers these differences to be strengths of community because every single person has a small piece of the answer inside of them to offer” (Cohen and Chambers, 2016, p. 26). It might speak to what constitutes a healthy community.
I also really like the idea of wellness journals, and I think I might try to use them this year too! They are not only a way of reflection, but are a source of evidence students might be able to pull forward as they begin the empathising stage of the design thinking cycle.
I wonder if you have considered a whole class component that might explore how you can bring wellness to the broader community (other classes, whole school, or local community). A part of Indigenous ways of knowing and learning is reciprocity and it would be cool to see how your class can work together to give back to the community to promote wellness.
Such a cool project, Ali! I would love to follow along and see how it goes for you this year!
Clint
Hi Clint,
Thank you so much for your feedback. I had the opportunity to look up the concept of “en’owkin wix” and include it in my lesson-plan reflection previously. It is such a beautiful idea, and ties in nicely with my inquiry project. Thank you for sharing, I didn’t realize it was local to you in the Okanagan until I looked into it more!
I am hoping to incorporate wellness journals this year too. It will be important especially with the pandemic’s impact on the classroom. I may not be able to incorporate the unit full-scale but would like to focus on assessment pieces, and the journal!
Thanks again, it has been lovely learning with you this term!
Hi Ali,
This is amazing!! I am social worker and had no idea how much teachers put into their work. I am very humbled. This is a very thoughtful, highly organized and well designed inquiry and is inspiring to me. I have learned a great deal about wellness. I love the First Nations teachings and how it is intertwined within all of the lessons. I was wondering, in terms of the journal rubric, could you utilize the outcome of each entry to determine what is underlying the resistance? From my background, we look at resistance of the client as a message (a beacon) there is something going on, within me as a counselor, that may be contributing to the onset of resistance or lack of interest of the client. For instance, am I pushing my agenda on the client? Am I bringing judgement, anger, apathy or stress into the relationship without inquiring into myself? Am I trusting the client’s own process from where they are at? To me, the rubric would be a clue to something larger going on in the client, for the resistance could also be the students own fear. This Inquiry certainly offers most of the core principles.
Hi Angela,
That is such an interesting point. As teachers, it is often that we will struggle with at least one student who is “resisting” something- for many reasons. Thank you for bringing this to light in regards to my wellness journals, very important to think about. Ideally, I would try to get to the bottom of this as you suggested, but would also hope to offer alternative methods if the journal truly isn’t working for them- (one to one conferencing, video journals, pictures etc.).
Thank you so much for your feedback!
Hi Ali,
You have very thoughtful designs in your project! I do agree with you that the “wellness” is quite important for students to learn! You know what? I was tortured by depression in the past. I did not have energy, expectation and hopes. My life was like a walking dead. I got depression due to my individual experiences. I was trying to find out the point of staying alive. Actually, I did not realize when I started changing my negative thinking and emotions, but now I can feel that I’m much better. At least, I feel happier than before and I have passion for moving on. In my country, teaching mainly focuses on academic learning. ”Wellness” of people is ignored seriously. I appreciate that in Canada, education pays attention to mental and physical health! If people cannot have happiness, what’s the point of academic study? What’s the meaning of having bachelor/master/PHD’ degree? Yes, I strongly support your ideas of wellness teaching involving students, families and even larger communities. Wonderful job!
Hi Ali,
I forgot to say, I appreciate the”design thinking” adopted in your project. It is a humanity pedagogy that students are able to design the activities of wellness by themselves. In this way, the wellness learning is more appropriate and it caters to what the generation expects, not limited in elders’ thinking. You apply this teaching topic in both PHE and ELA curriculum. I think that you can mainly focus on PHE, which is very suitable to employ this topic teaching. Overall, good job!