Blog Assignment #6

Asking Questions: What do teachers ask in order to be effective?

1. What kind of question?

The kind of questions that teachers ask can be the problem as to why students aren't doing well. If teachers ask closed-ended questions, students will not go into detail as to what they think about an issue. If students are asked open-ended questions, then it forces students to go into detail as to why they believe what they said. Just like in the video, Joanne Chesley described this concept with the story of Rosa Parks and asked questions describing each type of question. Closed-ended questions only require a yes or no answer while open-ended requires students to go in depth. By making the mistake of asking closed-ended questions, students aren't challenged leaving students confused and teachers frustrated. So to answer what kind of questions teachers should ask, I would say open-ended questions.

2. Does everyone understand?

How many times during a school day is this question asked? Do teachers really believe that all students understand? What happens to those students that don't understand but still say they do? These are questions as teachers that we have to beware of. By asking this question, it could put pressure on the student to say whether or not he or she understands. Going back to what Chesley discussed in her video, by asking "Does everyone understand?", it does not give the students the real chance to discuss because it gives a closed-minded question. It is so easy for a student to say yes or no to a question, especially when the rest of the class is answering. In order to avoid yes-or-no questions, be specific! Instead of asking students if they understand, ask certain students to do examples on the board or pass out mini boards to everyone and have a practice run of the concepts. Asking questions are important, but another kind of question teachers should ask are those that are specific to the area we are learning.

3. How do I ask questions?

Asking questions can be a difficult thing to do effectively. Think about how many questions are asked in a single day from the time you wake up to the time you go to sleep. What is the best way to ask questions without getting lost in a field of questions? 1. Prepare, 2. Play, and 3. Preserve. As teachers, we put so much time into our lesson plan but we do not plan our questions to ask our students. When we don't plan our questions, they could come out unclear, empty, and just confusing which only adds to student's hard time understanding. The next step is to play with questions. This only means that you do not answer the question right away. If you have the question on the board at the beginning of class, do different things to help answer it. Ways you can do this are to put the answer in your lecture, tell students to get into groups to discuss what they feel the answer is, bring it up another day and have students think about it at home, or have everyone write down their answer to the question and turn it in. This will have a better response then just asking and answering for the students. The final step is to preserve good questions. The easiest way to use this is telling students good questions that other students had. By making it known that students will be acknowledge for good questions. Taking notes is always a good thing during lecture. You can recall what students are saying, how they are reacting, and the questions that you are asking. This taught me that I should plan, play and preserve questions to be effective in the classroom.