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Inquiry-based education means that we create situations in which the students are placed so that they create, find, and/or construct the knowledge we want them to have on their own or in teams. I believe that knowledge acquired in this manner will be imbedded more deeply and retained for a longer period than knowledge gained through the more commonly accepted methods.

I have limited experience with inquiry-based education b/c I haven't found a way to use it extensively and still get through the mandated curriculum.

Ideally, I would like to use it exclusively to teach my chemistry course. However, since it took several hundred years to amass the current body of chemical knowledge through inquiry, I have to question if our students have that kind of time . . . or whether the administration would approve such a curriculum design.