“What we do in the classroom and what the teacher chooses to do with their time and their students' time really matters for equity, and it matters for excellence,” Australian researcher and author Nathaniel Swain, an expert in learning sciences, tells me in the following interview—it’s the reason these distinctions, which might seem kind of in-the-weeds, matter so much.
I made this video in response to questions, emails and comments I received after my appearance on the “Math Wars” episode of The Disagreement podcast in May of 2024. Readers noted that when we were discussing the differences between inquiry and explicit instruction, it isn’t always clear how to tell the difference, especially for those outside of education, like parents. So Swain and I get granular about what these two types look like most often in classrooms, and what the research says.
Enjoy!
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