Christine Orkisz Lang
Creating a well-structured Program of Inquiry (POI) is essential in the Primary Years Program (PYP), as it ensures that students experience a coherent and balanced curriculum across all grade levels. The POI acts as a roadmap for transdisciplinary learning, helping educators design units that build on students’ interests while covering key concepts and skills. It aligns learning experiences with the PYP’s six transdisciplinary themes, fostering connections across subjects and ensuring meaningful, inquiry-driven exploration. A strong POI supports student agency, reflects the school’s unique context, and lays the foundation for deep, lifelong learning.
To support your planning process, we’ve created a free downloadable POI review checklist—a practical resource to help you evaluate and refine your Programme of Inquiry. Whether you’re building a new POI or reviewing an existing one, this checklist offers clear guidance to ensure alignment with PYP principles and transdisciplinary best practices.
Transdisciplinary learning goes beyond traditional subject boundaries, integrating knowledge, skills, and concepts across disciplines to explore real-world issues. In the Primary Years Programme (PYP), transdisciplinary education is at the heart of the curriculum, ensuring that students engage in meaningful, interconnected learning experiences.
To better understand transdisciplinary teaching, it helps to contrast it with other approaches. Choi and Pak (2006) provide a useful analogy related to food: multidisciplinary learning is like a salad, where subjects remain separate but are combined; interdisciplinary learning is like a stew, where subjects blend but still retain distinct characteristics; and transdisciplinary learning is like a cake, where subjects are fully integrated and cannot be separated.
Transdisciplinary teaching and learning empower students to view knowledge as a connected whole rather than isolated subjects. This approach encourages critical thinking, problem-solving, and inquiry-driven exploration. It also helps students understand complex global issues from multiple perspectives, fostering deeper engagement and real-world application.
The advantages of transdisciplinary teaching include:
- Encouraging authentic learning experiences beyond subject boundaries
- Supporting student agency by incorporating their interests and questions
- Developing holistic understanding of global and local issues
- Enabling collaborative problem-solving across disciplines
- Fostering lifelong learning skills that extend beyond the classroom
In the PYP, students engage with six transdisciplinary themes that serve as the framework for inquiry-based learning:
1. Who we are
2. Where we are in place and time
3. How we express ourselves
4. How the world works
5. How we organize ourselves
6. Sharing the planet
Each PYP school develops a Programme of Inquiry (POI), ensuring that learning reflects the unique aspects of the school community. These themes provide students with opportunities to explore interconnected concepts, bridging disciplines and making learning more meaningful.
A great example of transdisciplinary learning in primary school is a “Sustainable Living” project, where students explore environmental issues through multiple subjects. In science, they study ecosystems, climate change, and recycling, conducting experiments like water filtration and composting. Mathematics helps them measure household energy use and waste production, while language studies involve writing persuasive letters and presenting sustainability ideas.
Creativity comes into play through art, as students design posters and build models of eco-friendly homes. Social studies and ethics encourage discussions on global sustainability practices and ethical consumption. Outdoor learning includes a school garden project and nature walks to observe biodiversity.
The project culminates in a Sustainability Fair, where students present their work to the school community, applying their knowledge in a meaningful, real-world way.
Changes in the PYP Transdisciplinary Themes
The PYP transdisciplinary themes have recently undergone refinements. While the themes themselves remain the same, there is a shift in descriptors to balance human experiences with the natural world.
In the new descriptors, the opening statement is designed to capture the essence of the theme, support the conceptual and transdisciplinary nature of the theme, rebalance subject connections, and make it easier to see connections across and between the themes.
An example of this change for the transdisciplinary theme How we Organize Ourselves is shown here:
Old Descriptor:
An inquiry into the interconnectedness of human-made systems and communities; the structure and function of organizations; societal decision-making; economic activities and their impact on humankind and the environment
New descriptor:
An inquiry into systems, structures, and networks through:
● interactions with and between social and ecological systems;
● approaches to livelihoods and trade practice - intended and unintended consequences;
● representation, collaboration, and decision-making
Schools are encouraged to start adopting these changes now, with full implementation required by September 2027.
Subject knowledge is needed to explore the themes, real-world problems, and concepts in depth. In the PYP, students must gain a basic understanding and skills in each of six disciplines to support knowledge integration: Mathematics, Language, Arts, Physical, Social and Personal Education, Sciences, and Social Studies.
Subject guidance is updated by the IB regularly, and all PYP subject continuums have been recently reviewed to be more future-facing and to support transdisciplinary learning. Visit the IB’s Programme Resource Center here for information.
Technology plays a crucial role in facilitating transdisciplinary education, and platforms like Qridi Core provide the tools needed to enhance this approach. Qridi Core supports transdisciplinary learning by:
- Offering customizable digital portfolios that allow students to document, reflect, and showcase their learning journey across subjects
- Enabling collaborative learning experiences, where students can engage in interdisciplinary projects
- Providing data-driven insights for educators to track student progress holistically
- Encouraging student agency by allowing learners to set goals, self-assess, and take ownership of their learning
By integrating Qridi Core into transdisciplinary teaching, schools can create more engaging, student-centered learning environments that prepare students for an interconnected world.
Transdisciplinary learning is a powerful approach that helps students make meaningful connections between subjects, fostering deeper understanding and real-world application. With the PYP's emphasis on inquiry-based, transdisciplinary education, and the support of innovative EdTech solutions like Qridi Core, educators can create dynamic, impactful learning experiences for students.
To deepen your understanding of transdisciplinary teaching and learning, consider exploring the following resources:
Qrdi Core has been developed independently from the International Baccalaureate (IB), and copyright licensure for the reproduction of IB content is pending.