Last Friday, May 1st, the Trafalgar-McGill CoLab held its annual showcase at the McGill Education Building. The room was bustling with conversations about educational research, partnerships, and collaboration. Topics included seven completed research projects, two ongoing studies, and two upcoming initiatives. The CoLab poster, presented last month in Finland at the International Association of Laboratory Schools Conference, was also featured. Learn more about the CoLab.
Amy Allison, English Teacher at Trafalgar School for Girls
The music room at Trafalgar School is usually filled with the sounds of instruments playing and students singing. But recently, those notes were replaced by dynamic conversations about the future of education. Clusters of Secondary I students sat surrounded by groups of pre-service teachers from McGill University’s Faculty of Education. The questions and answers flowed quickly as notes were furiously written.
What’s unique about this scene is that it’s the students who were leading the discussions.
The university students were visiting to learn more about the process of teaching through guided and open inquiry: How does it feel to have a say in your own learning? How do students decide what they want to study? Do they feel more curious about science because of this unique process or less?
The students answered without hesitation. They explained how their science class operates and how their teacher, Christianne Loupelle, has shown them how to ask good questions, be curious about the world around them, and feel a sense of ownership over their learning. For this hour-long discussion, the teens are the experts and the future educators are the learners.
This scene is only one example of how the Trafalgar-McGill CoLab is shifting what educational research can be.