EPD CPD Session Using Questions to Engage and Challenge

EPD CPD SessionUsing Questions to Engage and Challenge 28 February 2012

Session Objective To identify ways to improve questioning technique and to develop questions in order to: - promote higher order thinking - engage and challenge students - impact upon student progress

Quotes Socrates: defined teaching as ‘the art of asking questions’. Guy Claxton ‘Good learning starts with questions, not answers’.

The importance of questioning Why is questioning so important? Purpose of questions?

Make-over of a question Generate a question that you have used in the last week in your classroom.

Research Teachers ask 2 questions every minute, up to 400 a day, around 70,000 a year, 2-3 million in the course of a career. Most questions are answered in between 1 and 3 seconds (Carole Dweck). An average of 1 spontaneous question per lesson come from pupils – to do with procedure (Wragg)

Ofsted Evaluation Schedule ‘Good’ Grade Descriptors ‘Teachers have high expectations of all pupils’. ‘Teachers regularly listen astutely to, carefully observe and skilfully question groups of pupils and individuals during lessons in order to reshape tasks and explanations to improve learning’ ‘Teaching consistently deepens pupils’ knowledge and understanding’

Unproductive/lower order questions Recall Questions – answers already known to you/student. E.g. ‘Where/when did the event happen?’ Comprehension questions Closed questions – can be answered ‘yes’, ‘no’ I can’ Rhetorical questions – answer within the question E.g. ‘In what year was the War of 1812?’ Defensive questions – cause justification and resistance E.g. ‘Why didn’t you complete your IL again?’ Agreement questions - seeking agreement with your opinion E.g. ‘This is the best solution, isn’t it?’, ‘You all understand what you have got to do?’

Higher Order Questions Bloom’s Taxonomy (1952) – a framework used to develop questions that progress from concrete thinking to abstract thinking. Hierarchy of skills in thinking: - Children know before - they can apply before - they can evaluate

Questioning for challenge Higher Order Questions Explicit reference to higher order thinking skills E.g. ‘Do you think this is the best alternative?’ becomes ‘Evaluate these alternatives.’

Higher Order Questions Use Plurals E.g. ‘What ideas do you have? ‘What are some of your goals?

Higher Order Questions Tentativeness – might, maybe, take a risk ‘What might be some factors that would cause…? ‘In what other ways could you solve this problem?’

Higher Order Questions Evaluation questions Analytical questions Synthesis questions Examples of question stems– handouts Develop/create a question to ask in a lesson tomorrow – apply to your subject area. Reflect on why it is a higher order question.

Extreme Question Make-over Go back to question. Re-phrase to add rigour, challenge, high expectations, encourage higher order skills-based thinking

From the beginning of lessons Ask questions to prepare students’ mental and physical state for learning Get them thinking!

Starters What’s The Question? Answer – In the park

Starters Thunks A question about everyday things that stops you in your tracks and helps you look at the world in a new way If I lend you £1,000,000 does that make you a millionaire? Does everything have an opposite? If you want to fail and you succeed at failing, have you failed? www.thunks.co.uk

Starters What ifs…? Rubbish bins gave you £1 for every sack of rubbish?

Starters Which is biggest, best, beautiful?

Starters Would you rather…? Have foil teeth or feather fingers?

Starters 5,3,1 most important? Saw Drill Plane Screwdriver Hammer

Other strategies for asking questions Mind map strategies you use in your classroom

Other strategies for asking questions Plenary cube Deploy pause, prompt, probe routinely Give ‘think time’ Think, pair, share Encourage students to elaborate and reflect so they can demonstrate their thinking Use non-verbal cues to signal you want more Ask for evidence and reasoning behind an answer Ask another student to answer a question raised by a student ‘No hands’ to encourage participation of all Personalise/differentiate questions Give the answer and ask students what the question is Open up thinking/invite students to respond to others’ answers Use ‘phone a friend’, pair rehearsal, ‘ask the audience’ Ask learning questions, open questions Avoid gender bias

Reflection Record and share 2 strategies/key learning points to take away from session and try in the classroom. Session evaluation: WWW/EBI

EPD CPD Session Using Questions to Engage and Challenge