Effective Questioning

1. Effective Questioning Formative Assessment in Action Shirley Clarke

2. Organization and Training Strategies: • Wait Time • No Hands Up • Talking Partners • Framing the question

3. WAIT TIME • Some studies have shown that teachers wait an average of one second before answering an unanswered question or asking someone else.

4. With a partner: • Discuss some possible positive effects of adequate wait time during questioning.

5. What’s good about wait time? • Longer answers • Failure to respond decreases • More confident responses • More alternative explanations • Students challenge each other to improve answers

6. The “raise your hand” routine • Teachers often begin lessons with the “automatic question and answer” routine: • “So who can tell me……?” • “Who remembers the…..?” • “Raise your hand if you….?”

7. With a partner: • Discuss possible negative effects of having students raise their hand during questioning.

8. NO HANDS UP! • Same students have their hands up • Teacher chooses the “right” students to answer • Other students’ thought processes stop immediately • Some never even begin to think • Leads to more recall questions

9. Talking Partners • Ask a question and give students 30 seconds to talk with a partner about possible answers. • Compile a list of responses from a few pairs until an answer is agreed upon.

10. What’s good about talking partners? • Allows time to think and articulate • Gives less confident, shy students a voice • Shifts emphasis from the student to the response

11. Key Points: • Partners should be changed regularly (weekly etc.) • Random pairing has been shown to be most effective • Be sure to check the pairs before the lesson (for absentees etc.) • Create expectations for talking partner activities

12. With a partner: • Think of a higher order question from your content area that you might ask “talking partners” to answer. • Share a good question your partner developed.

13. Other ways to get students talking about content: • Snowballing – talking pairs share ideas with other pairs, fours combine and share to make eights. • Envoying – One student from each group moves to another group and shares ideas.

14. FRAMING THE QUESTION • Developing effective questions requires moving away from recall questioning. • Questions requiring higher order thinking processes can be developed by “reframing” recall questions. • Here are 4 strategies:

15. 1. Giving a range of answers • Give students a range of possible answers with the question • Provide the right answer(s) • Answers that are “close” or “it depends” answers • And answers that “can’t be right” • Have students categorize the answers

16. 2. Turning a question into a statement • Make a statement and ask students to discuss with their talking partner to decide if they agree or disagree. • Allows you to pose questions of higher DOK level.

17. 3. “One that works and one that doesn’t.” • Have students explain why one answer is correct or “works” and why another does not. • Talking partners discuss reasons to support one answer and refute the other.

18. 4. Giving the answer and asking how it was arrived at. • Pose the question and go straight to the answer. • Have talking partners discuss how to explain the answer. • Great for solving equations.

19. 5. Asking a question from an opposing standpoint. • Great potential for discussing issues in depth. • Forces students to think of issues from unconventional standpoints. • Good way to address different learning styles.

20. CREATING A SUPPORTIVE QUESTIONING ENVIRONMENT • Many students do not respond to questions out of fear or embarrassment. • Avoid words or tone of voice that create a negative climate. • Preface challenging questions with something like: “This is a tough one you’ll really have to think about.”

21. Responding to answers: • There are some ways to respond to right or wrong answers that can encourage analysis. • Careful redirection can also reduce over reliance on the teacher. • Most importantly, students need to feel “safe” when responding to questions.

22. Here are some ideas: • Gathering: “Thank you, does anyone have anything to add/agree/disagree?” • Echo: “Seventeen, would anyone like to agree or disagree?” • Stalling: “Hold that thought and we’ll come back to it later.”

23. More questioning ideas: • Transfer: “You read my mind, that’s the answer to another question I was going to ask.” • Ask for elaboration: “Tell me more, I’m not sure I get what you’re saying.” • Extra information: “You might also need to know….”

24. 3 Ways to Vary Questioning Style • Random Response • Choral Response • Signal Response

25. Random Response • Names of all students in a container • Ask students to think about the question, pause and draw a name • Use visual and verbal cues

26. Choral Response • Sometimes it is appropriate for the class to respond as a group • Use a verbal and visual cue to signal a “choral response” • Keeps a fast paced lesson going

27. Signal Response • Use in pairs or individually • Use individual size white boards • Thumbs up / Thumbs down • Multiple Choice Flip Cards • Student Responder System • Teach them to wait for the signal to respond

28. With a partner, discuss: • The benefits/impact of using these strategies… • The barriers…why we don’t see these strategies used more in our classrooms.