What are they and how do you write one?

Maria Consuelo C. Jamera Secondary School Teacher III

 Powerful questions that direct and focus student learning by allowing students to construct meaning and knowledge.

These are questions that touch our hearts and souls. They are central to our lives. They help to define what it means to be human. Most of the important thought we will conduct during our lives will center on such essential questions.

EQ

Open-ended (do not target a right answer

EQ

Require students to draw on content knowledge and personal experience.

Require students to synthesize and evaluate information

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EQ

Can be revisited over the course of time.

Lead to other questions posed by students.

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Lend themselves to interdisciplinary learning.

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Require students to develop a plan or course of action.

Require students to make a decision.

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Are more than a re-statement of learning objectives.

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Encourages critical thinking not just memorization of facts. Makes students produce original ideas rather than predetermined answers.

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Found at the top of Bloom's Taxonomy (Bloom, 1954).

They require readers to:

EVALUATE (make a thoughtful choice between options, with the choice based upon clearly stated criteria)
SYNTHESIZE (invent a new or different version)

ANALYZE (develop a thorough and complex understanding through skillful questioning).

How can our nation best handle the influx of

immigrants? What are the best examples of responsible disposal practices? When was the Declaration of Independence signed? Which city in Southeast Asia is the best place to live? Which serious disease most deserves research findings?

We can start essential question by:

Once you have learned how to ask relevant & appropriate questions, you have learned how to learn and no one can keep you from learning whatever you want or need to know.

Task:
st 1
nd 2
Form groups of three or four by subject, grade level or teaching team.

Choose one or more learning objectives that you teach.

rd 3

Formulate at least one essential question related to the objectives.

How would you? What would result if? How would you describe? How doescompare with? What is the relationship between? What would happen if? How could you change? How would you improve? How do you feel about? Why do you believe? What is your opinion of? What choice would you have made? What would you do differently? Why do you feel? How would you go about solving the problem? If you were in this position what would you do? Why do you/dont you support? What could improve?

*Identify, analyze & interpret sources and artifacts.

*Validate sources as to their authenticity, authority and bias. *Evaluate explanations by examining & comparing evidence.

*Analyze selected cultures which have affected history.

How do anthropologist know what happened thousand of years ago in ancient Egypt?

Apply knowledge of ratio & proportion to solve relationships between similar geometric figures.

How would you make an accurate model of the school playground?

Identify the major landforms and bodies of water of the Philippines.

Where are the best locations for new alternate energy sources such as wind farms?

Demonstrates understanding of Balance of Nature to conserve local biodiversity.

Why is there a need to understand balance of nature?

Creates real-life problems involving radical expressions and equations, and solves these by applying a variety of strategies with utmost accuracy.

How is the knowledge of radical expressions and equations used to solve real-life problems?

Takes part in an interactive story telling.

How does interactive storytelling recreate meaning of an experience?

Naipamamalas ng mag-aaral ang pag-unawa sa mga uri ng tula ng bawat panahon.

Patunayan na may panulaan na ang ating mga ninuno bago pa man dumating ang mga Kastila?

No Question

No Understanding

Essential Question Rubric (Taken from Grant Wiggins, Jay McTighe, 2002) Is the work focused on important, engaging, arguable, Big Idea questions? Proficient The questions are important and thought-provoking. They require more than a single correct answer, promoting inquiry rather than recall. They have great potential for engaging students to hook and hold their interest They provide a unifying rationale and priority to the work. They keep the learning of facts and skills focused on the Big Ideas.

Progressing The questions may be of interest to learners, but they do not focus on the most important and arguable Big Ideas and/or are too vague to guide learning and/or are too narrow and inconsequential. While they may not have a single correct answer, they do not seem likely to generate much in-depth investigation of the Big Ideas(s).
Not Yet Meeting Standard The questions are leading questions, used more to point to answers than generate inquiry. There is clearly a single correct unproblematic answer to be learned via recall or simple practice.