Do you teach Science? Or Inquiry?

Recently I had a conversation with an on-to-it 10 year old about school. 

They stated they 'did not do' Science at school.

On the surface this may be concerning, but it went deeper - this student was in the middle of an Inquiry with a heavy Science focus. 

When I asked this student what their favourite subject at school they answered 'Inquiry'. Why? 'I like the experiments we do and learning about real things'. 

Obviously this student was learning about key scientific principles - but had no idea this was Science. Maybe this is just semantics but I see this as a problem.

Before I continue I would like to point out I have no issue with an Inquiry Learning approach. With this statement in mind, here are my Top 5 reasons we should stop calling our Science/Social Studies/Arts subjects 'Inquiry'.

1. Making Connections. Adults talk about Science and History - kids bundle all these things into a 'subject' named Inquiry (see above). This makes it harder for students to make connections with the world outside of the classroom.

2. It's a Learning approach - not a Subject! Only calling some subject areas 'Inquiry' and not others implies (to teachers and students) that the Inquiry approach to learning only lends itself to certain subjects. This is wrong. Why not call Maths 'Inquiry'? PE 'Inquiry'? I know many teachers use an Inquiry approach for these subjects, but imagine if every time we did an Inquiry process in Maths we stopped teaching Maths and started teaching 'Inquiry'.

3. Subject Bias. By removing the word 'Science' from our teacher vocabulary (just look at any primary teachers planning to see how hard it is to spot this word) we emphasise subject importance to our students. Of course our students struggle in Science - they don't even know it is a subject! Every 7 year old could explain what they learn in Maths - ask them what they learn in Science...

4. Further Subject Bias. Maths and English is put on such a pedestal that we even tell students what area of the subject we are learning e.g. Geometry, Narratives, Statistics etc. I have yet to see a primary school teacher (including myself) put on their timetable Chemistry, Sociology or Physics. Are we teaching these things? Absolutely. Can young children learn the various sub-areas of Science and Social Studies? Of course - they do for Maths and English.

5. Is it even always Inquiry? To me, unless the students are going through some sort of 'Inquiry cycle' it is not really Inquiry Learning.

I will put my head on the block and say that I taught a 2 week integrated unit about Waitangi Day and wrote 'Inquiry' on the board every afternoon. Did we have a true Inquiry process? No. We went through some Inquiry aspects - but no more than what I would in Maths or Reading.

Maybe if I had have written 'History' on the board for 2 weeks a Grandfather may have seen it and offered to talk about his experiences, or a seed may have been planted for a child that they enjoyed learning about something called 'History' that stuck with them. Maybe a child would have made a connection with the outside world and realised the 'History channel' on TV was relevant to something they are learning at school...

So, lets either stop calling it 'Inquiry' or start calling every subject 'Inquiry'. The name of a subject holds more importance than we give it credit.