Blended learning 3

1. Blended learning 3 Teacher questioning

2. What are some purposes/reasons you would have for teachers asking questions?

3. Management • Initiating • Feedback • Promoting learning • Debriefing • Non pedagogical purposes

4. Management: • to pull a student who is dreaming/off task back into line: • to build students' self esteem/confidence

5. Initiating • discover the current range of opinions/explanations in the class to find out how much they already know AND/OR to start from their ideas or the conflicts between these • to stimulate debate/discussion • see if the students can suggest what to do next or how to do it • to generate a need to know by posing an intriguing question or problem

6. Feedback • do they recall some past work you hope to assume? • are they understanding? • what are their constructed meanings? • how are they reacting (e.g. to an issue)? • a dilemma on feedback: do you ask one student (if so who) or the whole class (if so how)?

7. Promoting learning • to stimulate a particular aspect of quality learning e.g. to maximize linking to the last topic or to their ideas • to build a culture where students are expected to be intellectually engaged • to have students work out the next bit of content (Principle 2) • to extend the work by applying it to new situations

8. Debriefing • This can involve any of a content, learning or social agenda • Variety is crucial –do not ask the same sorts of questions each time

9. Debriefing with a content agenda • Linking the activity to big ideas • Linking different activities to the same big idea • Linking different ideas

10. Debriefing with a learning agenda • Highlighting good learning behaviours, teaching procedures and (new) types of thinking • Debriefing on whether learning occurred –did some students rethink/change or elaborate their views/understandings • Debriefing on what is still puzzling/unclear

11. Debriefing with a social agenda • What are good collaborative behaviours? • Why these are worth investing time in building? • How they worked from this perspective • How they might change in the future

12. Some of the above purposes illustrate Principle 1 (sharing intellectual control)

13. Closed v open questions Closed (convergent) questions: often just one correct answer (or a limited number of intended answers) • provide clear focus • tend to require instant feedback • can build confidence in students (can also threaten) • lower order cognitive challenge?

14. The content is an important factor here English teachers are often working with divergent content Science teachers are often working with convergent content

15. Open-ended (divergent) questions: several possible valid answers, perhaps leading in unexpected directions • open up possibilities • perhaps less threatening to students?? (not just one right answer) • can be useful in stimulating lateral thinking (‘What if ?’ questions)

16. Open v Closed questions • Both have uses but some teachers do ask too many closed questions. Some situations are more appropriate to one form or the other. • There is a place for expecting particular responses: revision, feedback, principle 2. This is part of good teaching, but do not set it up as a (phoney) discussion. If you expect one answer do not pretend to ask students what they think.

17. Pedagogical v non pedagogical questions Pedagogical questions: directly relating to the set curriculum (subject content) • usually planned (but not always!) with some logical sequence in mind Non-pedagogical questions: building relationships and encouraging stronger sense of community • engaging the learner as a social being • could mean the difference between engagement or alienation