Wondering????

I think I am beginning to venture into the wondering stage. Since I have narrowed my topic down, my first order of business is to decide on what type of scrapbooking I want to do. The digital scrapbooking is appealing but I don't know anything about traditional scrapbooking so I want to try my hand at that first and then move onto the digital scrapbooks. I like to use KWL charts when I am brainstorming a topic or introducing something to my students. It is very interesting to see what children know about a topic and also what they want to know. For me the KWL chart just allowed me to structure the things I knew about scrapbooking and gave me guidance on what I wanted to know. Although I am feeling overwhelmed, I am really excited to have the opportunity to create this project.

This is the KWL chart I created to help me organize my thoughts and further my investigations.

I plan to come back to it often to add more items in the W & L sections.

More Watching

I thought about my topics and areas of interest and finally settled on the topic that interested me most. Although I feel very strongly about the humane treatment of animals, I decided that issue was something to explore at a different time in my life. I also wanted to learn more about the healthy living recipes for diabetics (my dad is insulin dependent) but found that two of my other topics just seemed to "pull" me to them.
As Kuhlthau states, "the motivation to seek information arises naturally out of the person's own experience." My motivation to learn more about podcasting and scrapbooking helped me to determine what my topic would be.
Although I want to learn more about podcasts, etc. I also know I have a great technology integrator who would be willing to work with me on this at a later date. She offers classes and release time to develop projects and provide assistance. I will save podcasting for next school year.

My desire to create a scrapbook for my son ultimately led me to my decision. So I plan to do my Inquiry Project about scrapbooking.
I feel that my research style/process more closely resembles that of the Presearch strategy by Virginia Rankin or Eisenberg's Big 6 model. I am very organized. I love to make lists and keep notes but when it comes to research and inquiry learning I am totally overwhelmed. I feel like i have all these ideas and when I try to get them on paper to make sense, it just doesn't work. I can only imagine how our K-12 students feel while trying to do these things.

Watching

Well, I am still watching. There are so many different things that I would like to explore but I know that I must narrow it down to a small list and then I'll be able to narrow it down to my final decision.
Here is a list of things that I would like to explore more information about. The humane an ethical treatment of animals, podcasting in the classroom and media center, digital scrapbooking (especially since my son is growing up so fast), and healthy eating for diabetics.

So many choices!!