The C3 Framework for Social Studies: Minimally Guided Instruction or Disciplined Inquiry?

This past week, I briefly engaged with post on LinkedIn from Drew Perkins, the president and director of Thought Stretchers Education, which offers professional development around project-based and inquiry learning. Perkins also hosts a podcast, which I listen to periodically. On the podcast, Perkins has often engaged the debate between advocates of inquiry-based learning and proponents of direct instruction. Perkins’ professional work has focused on inquiry-based learning, but I have appreciated his willingness to engage the other side, and take their points to heart. He has often pointed out that both sides have a tendency to create a straw man argument by painting their opponent in broad strokes. One side paints a picture where all forms of direct or explicit instruction are dry, teacher-monologue lectures with no student interaction; similarly, the other side portrays all forms of project-based, problem-based, or inquiry learning as unguided discovery learning. I have appreciated that Perkins has continually pointed out that there is a lot of daylight in the middle where great teaching and learning takes place. In his LinkedIn post this week, he was again pushing back on the straw man approach from one side, and advocating for more nuance.