Due to formatting, the chart is in list form. The first statement underneath each category involves the most learner self-direction; the last statement involves the least.
Inquiry Continuum
1. Learner engages in scientifically oriented questionsLearner poses a question
Learner selects among questions, poses new questions
Learner sharpens or clarifies question provided by teacher, materials, or other sourceLearner engages in question provided by teacher, materials, or other source
2. Learner gives priority to evidence in responding to questionsLearner determines what constitutes evidence and collects it
Learner directed to collect certain dataLearner given data and asked to analyze
Learner given data and told how to analyze
3. Learner formulates explanations from evidenceLearner formulates explanations after summarizing evidence
Learner guided in process of formulating explanations from evidence
Learner given possible ways to use evidence to formulate explanationLearner provided with evidence
4. Learner evaluate explanations when compared to other explanationsLearner independently examines other resources and forms the links to explanations
Learner directed toward areas and sources of other explanations
Learner given other possible explanations
Learner given all other explanations
5. Learner communicates and justifies explanationsLearner forms reasonable and logical argument to communicate explanations
Learner coached in development of communication
Learner provided broad guidelines to use sharpen communication
Learner given steps and procedures for communication
After examining the inquiry continuum in relation to the lab, it is quite clear that the particular version of the lab I explored fell somewhere between self-directed and teacher-directed. There was some room for exploration and for slight (if any) creativity on the students' part, although the question posed put a constraint on what the student could do to demonstrate its answer.
The first row (1) was fairly teacher-directed in that the learner "sharpens or clarifies question provided by teacher, materials, or other source." The lab described the common theory that stirring coffee cools it down, then poses the question that asks if you (the learner) could find out if that is true. It does not explicitly state that a lab must be set up that demonstrates coffee undergoing different variables (stirred, non-stirred, etc) but the learner is set up to come to that conclusion. Not much thought it involved in choosing what to test.
#2 examined the learner's priority to evidence in responding to questions, and here I felt the lab was slightly more learner-oriented than the previous row. The learner is "directed to collect certain data" as explained in the handout, but is given no data from which to bounce off of. This is a relatively open-ended area of the lab, but is still not at the maximum level of learner-centeredness.
The third row was a little fuzzy because the lab set up the explanation of evidence in its description, but did not state explicitly how evidence should be organized. It did tell the students what kind of data to collect, what broad statement (stirring cools liquid) to connect it to - but not how to organize it or any specific way to formulate that evidence into an explanation. In this sense, it was fairly material-directed, but there was some room for interpretation on the students' part as to how to present their explanations.
When it came to evaluating explanations in the 4th row, this was again slightly unclear as the only other "explanations" given in the lab were from other students/groups in the class. This lab was set up so that other explanations were not so cut-and-dry and were not dictated by the teacher to the students, so in that sense there was a great deal of inquiry among the students (particularly because other groups provided their own explanations). At the same time, students were not encouraged to independently research other explanations, so this fell somewhere in between.
The last row dealt with the learners' ability to communicate and justify these explanations. As aforementioned, there was a bit of a class forum in which each group shared their data in whatever form it took. No directions were given as to how the students could present this data, and (at the teacher's discretion) students were encouraged to share the logic behind the conclusions drawn from the evidence. It was in this sense that the learner formed "reasonable and logical argument[s] to communicate explanations."
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