ENHANCED INTERROGATION TECHNIQUES

David Perry

Objectives:

Establish why we ask questions Review Blooms taxonomy and apply to questioning techniques in education What different questions do we ask? Match questions to purposes Practise making better questions

Its a fact that

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An average teacher asks 400 questions in a day Thats 70,000 a year! One-third of all teaching time is spent asking questions Most questions are answered in less than a second
Steven Hastings TES 4 July 2003

Why do we ask questions in teaching?

Work with a teacher who you dont know. Decide which three reasons for asking questions are the most important Decide which three reasons for asking questions are the least important Tell the group your ideas.

What is the purpose of questions?

To assess prior learning

To check comprehension
To explain a complex point To ensure that students are engaged in what the teacher says To offer opportunities to grasp understanding in a semi autonomous way To empower learners to find the answer themselves To provide opportunities for praise To motivate learners To challenge misunderstanding To promote interaction/group discussion

To promote thinking

Spoken question technique offering options

Being able to answer questions makes us pay attention and feel good, AND offers opportunities for praise which can motivate and improve behaviour. You can create differentiation and provide opportunities for the empowerment of learners by narrowing down options creating a ball park to help learners answer. This is particularly useful if you ask a question and nobody can answer correctly To make it easier, offer two options Of course they shouldnt be too obvious! Maintaining a level of challenge is necessary to give the learner a sense of satisfaction when answering.

For example If the question Who's the President of France? ..proves too difficult

You can try Who's the President of France? Nicolas Sarkozy or Jose Luis Zapatero?

Try one yourself! Not too easy remember! Youve got a minute.

Who's the President of Venezuela?

"Positive strokes"
Being able to answer questions makes us pay attention and feel good, AND offers opportunities for praise which can motivate and improve behaviour.

Praise referred to in education and psychology as positive strokes and considered to be far more productive than negative strokes (telling people what they do wrong!) builds confidence, builds autonomy, builds rapport, increases engagement and participation and improves

Increasing and optimising positive strokes

When Billy answers correctly say "Yes" ask them to repeat so that everyone hears. Now we know: A) Everyone knows the correct answer even those who weren't listening/didn't hear the first time B) Billy is a clever chap

So Billy feels good, clever, confident, engaged, and others see that being clever and engaged is a good thing and may also want to answer.

Thinking time

Thinking time increases the quality of answers Teachers should allow thinking time before expecting answers. This can be done by providing written questions, allowing time, then providing more time for share and compare strategies

Thinking time and differentiation

This is a simple and easy differentiation technique that you can put on your lesson plan (and get a better grade) Allows less confident learners to check their ideas Creates opportunities to rehearse and refine ideas Works well with directed (names) questions Avoids problem of the same learners answering all the questions.

Instant differentiation!
Directed questions in conjunction with pair work and thinking time = instant differentiation
Put something like this on your lesson plan, use it and improve your observation grade. "Differentiation will be achieved via pair work and thinking time so that all learners have an opportunity to rehearse and refine answers before feeding back to the class."

Asking better questions

Teachers spend most of their time asking lowlevel cognitive questions (Wilen, 1991). These questions concentrate on factual information that can be memorized (ex. What year did the Civil War begin? or Who wrote Great Expectations?). It is widely believed that this type of question can limit students by not helping them to acquire a deep, elaborate understanding of the subject matter.

Blooms taxonomy
Order these ways of understanding in order of depth. Eg. Surface understanding = 5 Deep understanding = 1

Blooms Taxonomy (1956)!

The Jabberwocky problem

The Jabberwocky Problem Twas brillig and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogroves, And the mome raths outgrabe.

What does Bloom mean to us?

The way we ask our questions encourages learners to demonstrate different types of learning Some will need to answer knowledge or comprehension questions, but some need to be pushed a bit more with questions that demand analysis, synthesis or evaluation. When beginning a teaching point you may want to ask low level questions to establish a context, then gradually move towards higher level questions. Some people (Guy Claxton Uni. of Bristol) suggest that higher level questions are

Different types of questions encourage different levels of learning

Fancy being Parkinson?

You are teaching learners about the Task history of the England football team under Steve McClaren and Fabio Capello. Make three questions for your students to address the higher levels of Bloom. 1) 2) 3)

You are teaching learners about customer service skills in a retail environment.
Make three questions for your students to address the higher levels of Bloom. 1) 2) 3)

Task

You are teaching a session about the best way to feed a dog. Make three questions for your students to address the higher levels of Bloom. 1) 2) 3)

Task

Task
You are teaching a session about the history of Louis and Chezza from the Xfactor.
Make three questions for your students to address the higher levels of Bloom. 1) 2) 3)