For this inquiry project assignment for EDCI 336, I will look at how I can support the inquiry process for other learners. Inquiry as a process aligns with my philosophy of learning and educating, and is an educational approach that I have been in relationship with since my training in early childhood education.

The Reggio Emilia-inspired style of education that was the foundational approach of my diploma in early childhood education, challenged me to think about the interests, explicit or implicit, of the child, along with the underlying developmental stage of each domain and respond in a curricular way to scaffold the child’s understanding, abilities, and development. In the last semester of my diploma, we were introduced to the project approach (Helm & Katz, 2000).

Whether as a practicing early childhood education in Ontario, Japan, or in British Columbia, it was my initial training that set the foundation for my interest in self-driven learning. Before entering the PDP program at UVic, my career in early childhood education culminated with this project; an effort to help early childhood educators understand and practice an inquiry-driven approach referred to as pedagogical narrations in British Columbia.

As an education student, the inquiry project I did for EDCI 360, entitled, ‘What if the Goal of Education was Flow?’, was driven by the, slightly, more digestible question, ‘How do we help students reach a state of flow to maximize engagement and learning?’ One of the criteria for reaching a flow state, according to Csikszentmihalyi (1988), is intrinsic motivation. Reflecting on my own life, the moments I felt the most joy in a success, as defined by my own parameters/conditions, I had decided the learning path to embark on; I knew what I knew, and I knew what I didn’t know – which led me to the understanding of I wanted or needed to know – which led me to a state of knowing. And I’m not saying that that knowing is all-knowing, that the knowing is complete or perfect, or that my knowing is better than anyone else’s knowing. No. But what it does mean, for me, is that when I was able to act on my own interest in something, I tapped into intrinsic motivation and that energy source fueled my inquiry. And now, it seems like a natural progression to learn more about Reggio Emilia, project-based learning, pedagogical documentation/narration from the perspective of inquiry; to develop my skills using another set of literature, resources, and experiences. And so, as stated above, I will start this inquiry by looking into the inquiry-based learning literature to find out how I can support the inquiry process for other learners.