How have you made use of social studies theories and research to improve your inquiry skills during your internship?

 During my internship as a student teacher, I felt like I did not focus too much on improving my own inquiry skills. I mainly focused on improving the inquiry skills of my students. But nonetheless, there were still many things I learned about history during this internship and I used social studies research and theories when I did use my inquiry skills. I learned many things about history while student teaching. They say that you don't really know something until you teach it. From my experience so far, that is entirely true. There were many topics that I was familiar with but did not know to the full extent required by being a teacher. Now I know much more about topics like African and Chinese history. When I was creating my lessons for those units, I used social studies inquiry skills. I looked for credible sources. I mostly looked at secondary sources to save time. However, I looked at multiple secondary sources about a topic to not only find the best resources for my students but also to hear different perspectives on historical events or persons. For example, I was reading about Empress Wu Zetian for my Chinese history unit. Some past scholars saw her as a brutal tyrant who used any means to gain power. Now, more modern historians see that behavior as in line for how other emperors of China acted.