Effective Questioning Techniques Questioning and Discussion Techniques Workshop

Effective Questioning Techniques Questioning and Discussion Techniques Workshop Thursday, March 7, 2013 Metamora Township High School 7: 15 – 8: 00 a. m. , 3: 30 – 4: 15 p. m. 12/2/2020 For Scintillating, Stimulating, Substantive Class Discussions Effective Questioning Techniques 1

Questioning: Utopia 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 2

Questioning: Reality 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 3

What’s Your Process? • What process do you go through to develop questions for your lessons? - Do you have them in your mind? - Do you write them down? - Do you embed them in a Power. Point or handout? - Something else? 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 4

Speaking of Relevance… • Why is it important to have good questions? 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 5

Characteristics of a Good Question • What makes a question a “good” question? 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 6

That’s a Good Question! • What about covering materials? We only have so much time! Thus, the importance of well planned questions. Keep in mind that CCSS focuses on depth vs. breadth. 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 7

Excellent Questions • What question have you asked this semester that has generated the most (or best) classroom discussion? 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 8

Goal • To help teachers become more deliberate in their planning regarding the development and use of questions (if they are not already). 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 9

Types of Questions (by Purpose) • Lead-Off Questions – Stimulate thinking, generate discussion, and make students aware of main point (Pre. Planned) • Follow-Up Questions – Guide the lesson progression by supplying sub-ideas to promote student reasoning (Pre. Planned) • Spontaneous Questions – Needed during the lesson to get students back on track, to ask for clarification or examples, or to ask about connections between student responses (Unplanned) 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 10

Types of Questions (by Nature) • Rhetorical Questions – Questions designed to generate thought, but not specific replies; they promote learning by focusing students on a new angle or by getting them ready for a new direction in the lesson • Open-Ended Questions – Questions that cannot be answered with a simple one-word answer (such as “yes, ” “no, ” or simply stating a remembered fact); they promote learning by requiring students to consider multiple viewpoints and offer justification for or explanation of their response; these questions tend to stimulate more discussion and tend to address higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy • Closed-Ended Questions – Questions that can be answered with specific responses; they can be used to assess student comprehension or retention of information and tend to address lower levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 11

No Such Thing as a Bad Question? Well…. • Closed-Ended Questions – May not be the best choice if lively studentto-student discussion and consideration of multiple viewpoints is desired • Foggy Questions – Questions that are unclear (Ex: “What happened in the United States in 1994? ” vs. “What significance is there to the congressional elections that took place in November 1994? ”) • Multiple Questions – Stick with one question at a time since asking two or more questions at once can be confusing for students (Ex: “How did the President say he would handle the deficit, and how did he say he would deal with Bosnia? ”) • Leading Questions – Questions where the answer the teacher wants to hear is implied (Ex: “The NTC is part of BLM, isn’t it? ” or “Wouldn’t you agree that the author’s tone is whiny and annoying? ”) 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 12

Implementing Open-Ended Questions • Open-ended questions can be used to accomplish various instructional purposes • Define your purpose for the lesson and for each activity within the lesson, and then craft questions to achieve those purposes 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 13

Questions 12/2/2020 Effective Questioning Techniques 14

Up Next… Once you have good QUESTIONS, the next step is to consider all of the other elements that create a scintillating, stimulating, substantive DISCUSSION! Cathy 12/2/2020 Pete Effective Questioning Techniques Lisa 15