What Helps Children Stay Curious About Learning?

Children ask a remarkable number of questions.

Why does the moon follow the car?

How does a bird know where to go?

What would happen if I mixed these together?

Can I build one myself?

Then they get older, and the questions change. They become more complicated, more specific, and sometimes much harder to answer.

That curiosity can be a powerful part of learning.

For parents, the question becomes: How can school give children opportunities to keep using it?

At PEAK Mastery, that question has influenced how we are designing the school.

Curiosity Still Needs Good Teaching

Giving students opportunities to explore does not mean asking them to figure everything out alone.

A child who is fascinated by space still needs someone to teach them how to read increasingly complex texts. A student who wants to design a bridge needs mathematical knowledge before they can calculate whether it will stand. A wonderful question can open the door to learning, but students also need knowledge, instruction, practice, feedback, and support.

That balance is important to PEAK Mastery's proposed model.

Students would receive explicit foundational instruction in literacy and mathematics while also having opportunities to investigate questions, discuss ideas, work on interdisciplinary projects, and apply what they know through Wonder Workshops and other real-world learning experiences.

Research on inquiry and discovery learning supports this kind of balance. Student exploration can support learning when appropriate guidance is provided, while minimally guided instruction can create difficulties, particularly for learners who have limited prior knowledge.¹ ²

Curiosity gives students somewhere interesting to go. Good instruction helps them get there.

What Happens When a Student Needs More Time?

Parents know that children rarely arrive at the same lesson with exactly the same knowledge.

One student may understand multiplication quickly and struggle with writing. Another may devour novels and need much more time with fractions.

Sometimes the difference is even smaller.

A child understands most of a concept but is missing one piece that everything else depends on.

PEAK Mastery's mastery-based approach is designed to make those differences visible.

Students would work toward clearly defined competencies aligned with the Utah Core Standards. Teachers would use assessments, student work, projects, portfolios, observations, and other evidence of learning to understand what a student has mastered and where additional instruction may be needed.

Research on mastery learning has found positive average effects when students receive clear learning objectives, feedback, corrective instruction, and additional opportunities to reach mastery.³ ⁴ Formative assessment research also supports using evidence of student understanding to adjust teaching and learning.⁵

For a child, that can translate into a very practical experience:

I don't understand this yet. What do I need to work on next?

That is a much more useful question than simply wondering whether they are “good” at the subject.

Curiosity Needs Somewhere to Go

Sometimes a child asks a question that deserves more than a five-minute answer.

What actually lives in the river near our house?

Why was our town built here?

Could we design something that uses less water?

How would we convince someone that our solution would work?

PEAK Mastery's Wonder Workshops are designed to give students opportunities to pursue larger questions through interdisciplinary learning.

A project might connect science with reading, writing, mathematics, history, communication, or art. Fieldwork, community partnerships, service learning, and Extended Learning Experiences can give students opportunities to take knowledge they have developed in school and use it in another setting.

Research on learning and transfer has long emphasized that knowing something in one context does not automatically mean a learner will recognize when or how to use it somewhere else. Opportunities to apply knowledge across situations can help students develop more flexible understanding.⁶

For PEAK Mastery, real-world learning is therefore connected to the academic learning happening around it. The experience gives students somewhere to use what they know.

Children Can Learn to Take More Ownership

A kindergartner and a high school student should have very different levels of responsibility for directing their education.

Agency develops.

Young children may need considerable help choosing an appropriate goal, organizing their work, recognizing when they are stuck, and deciding when to ask for help. As students grow, they can take increasing responsibility for those decisions.

Research on self-regulated learning points to skills such as setting goals, monitoring progress, selecting strategies, and reflecting on results.⁷ Self-Determination Theory also identifies autonomy, competence, and relatedness as important parts of human motivation, with educational research emphasizing the value of supporting autonomy within an appropriately structured learning environment.⁸

PEAK Mastery's coaching model is designed to give students opportunities to practice those skills with an adult who knows them.

Students would set goals, review progress, reflect on their work, build portfolios, and participate in student-led conferences. Coaches would help them understand where they are progressing and where they need additional support.

Over time, a student can become increasingly capable of answering:

What am I working toward?

How do I know if I understand it?

What should I try next?

When do I need help?

Those are useful questions far beyond school.

Relationships Give Educators Context

Curiosity can be easy to miss.

The student who rarely raises their hand may have been thinking about the lesson all afternoon. The child who seems uninterested may actually be confused. Another student may have understood the material days ago and be ready for something harder.

Knowing the student helps.

Research has found meaningful associations between positive teacher-student relationships and student engagement, with smaller associations with academic achievement.⁹ Research on school belonging has also connected students' experiences of acceptance and belonging with participation, motivation, and other aspects of school life.¹⁰

That research is one reason relationships have such a deliberate place in PEAK Mastery's design.

Every student would have a licensed educator who serves as their coach and teacher of record. The current model is designed so coaches can remain with students for up to three years when possible, giving them time to understand a student's goals, strengths, challenges, progress, and family context.

A coach can remember what worked last time.

They can notice a pattern.

They can ask a better question because they know the history behind the answer.

That kind of continuity is central to how PEAK Mastery plans to personalize learning.

Movement Belongs in the School Day, Too

Children also have bodies.

They need opportunities to move, play, work with their hands, go outside, collaborate, and change what they are doing during the day.

Research reviews have found associations between physical activity, fitness, cognitive function, and academic outcomes in children, although the size and consistency of effects vary across studies and outcomes.¹¹ PEAK Mastery's research framework includes movement and well-being as one of several conditions considered in the school's design.

Our proposed model includes Community Wellness and Leadership, hands-on Wonder Workshops, fieldwork, Extended Learning Experiences, and other opportunities for students to learn in ways that involve more than sitting at a desk.

Movement is part of a full school experience.

What We Want Students to Keep

A child's relationship with learning will change as they grow.

The questions will become harder. The work will require more persistence. Some subjects will come easily, and others will require repeated effort. Students will encounter things they would never have chosen to study on their own.

We want them to keep asking questions anyway.

We want students to become capable of saying:

I don't understand this yet.

I want to know why.

Can I try another way?

How does this connect to something I already know?

Where could I use this?

Who can help me figure it out?

PEAK Mastery is being designed around strong foundational instruction, mastery-based learning, Wonder Workshops, coaching relationships, student reflection, movement, and opportunities to apply learning beyond the classroom. The goal is to give students both the structure they need to learn difficult things and opportunities to remain active participants in that learning.

Because curiosity becomes much more powerful when a child also develops the knowledge and skills to follow it somewhere.

Could PEAK Mastery Be a Good Fit for Your Family?

PEAK Mastery is currently moving through Utah's charter approval process, and community interest is an important part of that work.

If our approach to mastery-based learning, real-world experiences, strong relationships, and student ownership sounds like something your family would like to see in Cache Valley, we would love to hear from you.

Take the PEAK Mastery Interest Survey

Research Cited

1. Kirschner, P. A., Sweller, J., & Clark, R. E. (2006). Why Minimal Guidance During Instruction Does Not Work: An Analysis of the Failure of Constructivist, Discovery, Problem-Based, Experiential, and Inquiry-Based Teaching. Educational Psychologist, 41(2), 75–86.

2. Alfieri, L., Brooks, P. J., Aldrich, N. J., & Tenenbaum, H. R. (2011). Does Discovery-Based Instruction Enhance Learning? Journal of Educational Psychology, 103(1), 1–18.

3. Guskey, T. R., & Pigott, T. D. (1988). Research on Group-Based Mastery Learning Programs: A Meta-Analysis. The Journal of Educational Research, 81(4), 197–216.

4. Kulik, C. C., Kulik, J. A., & Bangert-Drowns, R. L. (1990). Effectiveness of Mastery Learning Programs: A Meta-Analysis. Review of Educational Research, 60(2), 265–299.

5. Black, P., & Wiliam, D. (1998). Assessment and Classroom Learning. Assessment in Education, 5(1), 7–74.

6. Pellegrino, J. W., & Hilton, M. L. (Eds.). (2012). Education for Life and Work: Developing Transferable Knowledge and Skills in the 21st Century. National Academies Press.

7. Zimmerman, B. J. (2002). Becoming a Self-Regulated Learner: An Overview. Theory Into Practice, 41(2), 64–70.

8. Niemiec, C. P., & Ryan, R. M. (2009). Autonomy, Competence, and Relatedness in the Classroom: Applying Self-Determination Theory to Educational Practice. Theory and Research in Education, 7(2), 133–144.

9. Roorda, D. L., 

10. Koomen, H. M. Y., Spilt, J. L., & Oort, F. J. (2011). The Influence of Affective Teacher-Student Relationships on Students' School Engagement and Achievement: A Meta-Analytic Approach. Review of Educational Research, 81(4), 493–529.

11. Osterman, K. F. (2000). Students' Need for Belonging in the School Community. Review of Educational Research, 70(3), 323–367.

12. Donnelly, J. E., et al. (2016). Physical Activity, Fitness, Cognitive Function, and Academic Achievement in Children: A Systematic Review. Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, 48(6), 1197–1222.