Inquiry Into Learner Profile: Open-Minded

This is part of a series of inquiry-based provocations for essential elements of the PYP and the Learner Profile. For more, click here.

We often associate open-mindedness as being important among places of great diversity. It may be even more important in more heterogeneous locations. Rather than assuming our kids have the general idea of its meaning and importance, it should be an ongoing conversation in which kids can make connections and come to conclusions for themselves. Which, of course, is the very purpose of this week’s provocation!

Resource #1: Often Do You Challenge Your Biases? by Soul PancakeGreat way to get kids thinking about biases. Could be interesting to conduct a similar experiment via a Mystery Skype-type approach with children from other classrooms?

Resource #2: The Things Kids Carried photo essay by Isabel FattalI wonder what would happen if we asked kids to draw what they think backpacks in different countries look like before showing them the photo essay?

via The Atlantic

Resource #3: Perspective by Lauren PedrosaGreat conversation starter about what the word, perspective, means, and how it impacts our thinking.

Resource #4: This Is How We Do It by Matt LaMotheWhat I especially loved about this book was the emphasis that no one family can be representative of an entire country–I remember being very confused by a DK version of this book when I was young. This is a wonderful tool to help us better understand how children around the world are alike and different). 

Resource #5: Harold & the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson


Resource #6: Finding Wild by Megan Wagner Lloyd & Abigail Halpin

Provocation Questions:

  • What does an open-minded mindset look like?
  • How can a person’s open-mindedness change over time?
  • What is our responsibility to be open-minded when we are surrounded by people who seem different? Who seem alike?

featured image: DeathToTheStockPhoto

Inquiry Into Attitudes: Commitment

This is part of a series of inquiry-based provocations for essential elements of the PYP and the Learner Profile. For more, click here.

Anyone who works with kids knows that much of that effort is a balancing act. And when it comes to balance, commitment involves quite a lot of that balance. Think about it–we want kids to develop the skills to stick with things even when it’s hard, but we also want them to learn to recognize and honor when specific pursuits no longer work for them (ie, notion of abandoning books that aren’t doing it for you, trading soccer for theater, etc). Inviting kids into the conversation about how to build commitment while honoring autonomy is key. So as you take a look at these incredible examples of commitment, you might consider how to invite dialogue on this element of balance as well!.

Resource #1: “Be A Control Freak / Lily Hevesh” by Telia Carrier via The Kid Should See This

Resource #2: Stukenborg by Charles William Kelly

Resource #3: The Genius of Marie Curie by Ted-Ed

Resource #4: “A Lady Has the Floor: Belva Lockwood Speaks Out for Women’s Rights” by Kate Hannigan & Alison Jay

Provocation Questions: 

  • What does it mean to be committed to your work?
  • How does commitment impact our work as individuals? As communities?
  • How do we balance commitment with trying new things?
  • What is our responsibility to be committed in our work?
  • How does commitment change over the course of a person’s life?

featured image: DeathToTheStockPhoto

Inquiry Into Learner Profiles: Risk-Taker

This is part of a series of inquiry-based provocations for essential elements of the PYP and the Learner Profile. For more, click here.

Risk-taker has always been my favorite of the PYP learner profiles. It seemed the most natural of conversations in the classroom as it connected to any new venture on which we embarked. After all, authentic learning takes a large degree of courage. But do how often do we really dive into naming and investigating what it really means to be a risk-taker as a learner? This provocation is designed to help students ponder more the what and why of risk-taking.

Resource #1: The Courage to Invent: A NASA Roboticist Tells Her Story by NPR via The Kid Should See This

Resource #2: Malala’s Magic Pencil by Malala Yousafzai

Resource #3: (for a touch of playfulness) Don’t Put Any Coins In This Cardboard Coin Box via The Kid Should See This

Resource #4: Piper short by Pixar 

Resource #5: Picture Books: I’m Trying to Love Spiders by Bethany Barton; Jubari Jumps by Gaia Cornwall; The Dark by Lemony Snicket & Jon Klassen

Provocation Questions: 

  • What is the connection between risk-taking and creativity?
  • How do we know we are really taking a risk?
  • What’s the difference between positive risk-taking and negative risk-taking?
  • What are the perspectives on risk-taking? Does that perspective change for people over their lifetimes?

featured image: DeathToTheStockPhoto

Inquiry Into Goal-Making

We’re in the business of growth as educators. But the act of actually setting tangible goals can be intimidating for us all. Why not start by investigating with your class what it means to set goals to get the dialogue going?

Resource #1: What’s Stopping You From Achieving Your Goals by Soul Pancake

Resource #2: One Little Word by Ali Edwards

Resource #3:  Kids Health Facts on Setting Goals

Resource #4: Kobi Yamada & Mae Besom’s books (these are wonderful provocations to help students consider growth and progress through problems and ideas).

Provocation Questions: 

  • What is a goal?
  • Why do people set goals?
  • What are the different perspectives on setting goals?
  • What is our responsibility to grow?
  • How does an individual’s goal-setting impact their life? Their community?

featured image: DeathToTheStockPhoto

Inquiry Into Learner Profiles: Principled

This is part of a series of inquiry-based provocations for essential elements of the PYP and the Learner Profile. For more, click here.

What does it mean to be principled? This one can be so broad and abstract, that even my fifth graders struggled with it from time to time. Most know that it has some correlation to honesty, but beyond that can get a bit hazy. Here are some resources that might help your students identify some of the nuances to being and becoming more principled.

Resource #1: Randy Pausch — Live the Right Way (part of a talk given during the terminal stages of Randy’s cancer).

Resource #2: “Dear Report Cards, You Suck” by 6th grade student, Lynton, who is a student in Abe Moore’s classroom where they strive to focus on the learning rather than the grades (click image to link to Lynton’s work).

Resource #3: Penny & Her Marble by Kevin Henkes

Resource #4: We Found a Hat by Jon Klassen

Resource #5: Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett & Jon Klassen

Provocation Questions:

  • How does being principled connect to being honest with others?
  • How does it connect to being honest with ourselves?
  • What does it mean to be “true to yourself?” What is our responsibility to be true to ourselves?
  • How does a person being principled impact our school? Our community? Our world?

featured image: DeathToTheStockPhoto

Inquiry Into Learner Profiles: Caring

This is part of a series of inquiry-based provocations for essential elements of the PYP and the Learner Profile. For more, click here.

For a culture of kindness to truly grow in our school, we need to constantly nourish and discuss it. After all, if we limit the discussion to the occasional anti-bullying assembly we can’t really expect students to thoroughly catch the vision of what it really looks like, and to feel comfortable speaking up for kindness. If your class is in need of a recharge, please use any or all of these resources to inquire into what it means to be caring!

Resource #1: “Give a Little Love, Get A Little Love” Kritovatka

Resource #2: Kind is…Radical Hospitality by Soul Pancake

Resource #3: The Gnomist: A Great Big Beautiful Act of Kindness by Great Big Story (this is a longer video at 17 minutes, but if you happen to be able to make the time, I promise it’s worthwhile. Here’s the trailer, too!)

Resource #4: “Those Shoes” by Maribeth Boelts and Noah Z. Jones

Provocation Questions: 

  • What does it mean to be caring?
  • What is people’s responsibility to be caring?
  • What are the different perspectives in a community when it comes to public acts of kindness?
  • What are some obstacles that sometimes stand in the way of expressing caring?
  • What can we do to overcome obstacles that sometimes stand in the way of being caring?

featured image: DeathToTheStockPhoto

Inquiry Into Learner Profiles: Knowledgeable

This is part of a series of inquiry-based provocations for essential elements of the PYP and the Learner Profile. For more, click here.

I wrote a post as recently as just a few weeks ago about the need to prioritize relationships over content. But, of course, that does not mean that content does not have its own essential place. This week’s provocation is about being knowledgeable, and why that matters.

Resource #1: How The Animal Kingdom Sleeps by The Atlantic, via The Kid Should See This

Resource #2: Lisa Winter Robot Builder, via The Kid Should See This

Resource #3: Google Engine Timelapse Page

“Timelapse is an example that illustrates the power of Earth Engine’s cloud-computing model, which enables users such as scientists, researchers, and journalists to detect changes, map trends, and quantify differences on the Earth’s surface using Google’s computational infrastructure and the multi-petabyte Earth Engine data catalog.”

Resource #4: If Picasso Painted A Snowman, by Amy and Greg Newbold

Provocation Questions: 

  • How does knowledge impact our actions?
  • How does knowledge impact our ability to relate to people and events around us?
  • What is the relationship between knowledge and curiosity?
  • What is our responsibility to be knowledgeable, especially if we have Google to help us answer so many questions?

featured image: DeathToTheStockPhoto