I-Search

Ken Macrorie created the I-Search model with his publication of The I-Search Paper (1988) and Macrorie’s work has since been enhanced and supported by subsequent publications such as Joyce and Tallman (1997) and Duncan and Lockhart (2005). The I-Search model is an inquiry-based, student-based process model that utilizes the power of students’ questions and interests in order to incorporate student feelings and provoke reflection throughout the research process.

The I-Search model posits four phases of instruction:

Building background knowledge and Developing Question:
Students engage in activities to discover what they know and to build background knowledge. Students are guided to a personally motivated inquiry. Information gathering behaviors are modeled.

Search Plan:
Students develop a search plan and identify the resources that will be used to answer the question that was developed.

Gathering Information:
Students gather information and construct meaning.

Creating the I-Search Report:
Students draft and publish an I-Search Report which becomes the basis for a presentation and sharing of knowledge of some kind.

The I-Search process is exceptional in many ways, not the least of which are its consideration of the impact that students’ background knowledge has on their attitudes and approach to the research process. Similarly, the I-Search process is extremely flexible for students to tailor their projects to develop their own learning (i.e., constructivism in action). In this way, the diversity of a classroom’s background knowledge is ameliorated as students are able to begin where they are at and develop their projects accordingly.

Books

Duncan, Donna and Laura Lockhart. I-Search, You Search, We all Learn to Research: A How-To-Do-It Manual for Teaching Elementary School Students to Solve Information Problems. New York: Neal-Schuman, 2000.

Duncan, Donna and Laura Lockhart. I-Search for Success: A How-To-Do-It Manual for Connecting the I-Search Process with Standards, Assessments, and Evidence-Based Practice. New York: Neal-Schuman, 2005.

Joyce, Marilyn Z. and Tallman, Julie I. Making the Writing and Research Connection with the I-Search Process. How-To-Do-It Manuals for Librarians (Number 62). Neal-Schuman, 1997.

Macrorie, Ken. The I-Search Paper. Rev. ed. Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook, 1988.

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