Inquiry Teaching in Social Studies and the Social Sciences: A Critical Review of Research Findings 1967–1972

Abstract

In this paper, twenty-eight recent research studies on inquiry teaching in social studies and the social sciences are reviewed. Although a number of statistically significant results were claimed by the respective researchers, methodological deficiencies in many of the studies greatly reduce the importance of their efforts. Reference is made to a number of research deficiencies, including unsuitable evaluation instruments, lack of comparability of groups, lack of comparability of tasks and instructors for experimental and control groups and inadequate research designs. Although inquiry teaching has become widely espoused as a teaching method in schools, there are few substantial research studies to support its superiority over other teaching methods.