Classroom
Questions
Amy
C. Brualdi,
ERIC
Clearinghouse on Assessment and Evaluation
In
1912, Stevens stated that approximately eighty percent of a teacher's school
day was spent asking questions to students. More contemporary research on
teacher questioning behaviors and patterns indicate that this has not changed.
Teachers today ask between 300-400 questions each day (Leven and Long, 1981).
Teachers
ask questions for several reasons (from Morgan and Saxton, 1991):
- the
act of asking questions helps teachers keep students actively involved in
lessons;
- while
answering questions, students have the opportunity to openly express their
ideas and thoughts;
- questioning
students enables other students to hear different explanations of the
material by their peers;
- asking
questions helps teachers to pace their lessons and moderate student
behavior; and
- questioning
students helps teachers to evaluate student learning and revise their
lessons as necessary.
As
one may deduce, questioning is one of the most popular modes of teaching. For
thousands of years, teachers have known that it is possible to transfer factual
knowledge and conceptual understanding through the process of asking questions.
Unfortunately, although the act of asking questions has the potential to
greatly facilitate the learning process, it also has the capacity to turn a
child off to learning if done incorrectly. The purpose of this digest is to
provide teachers with information on what types of question and questioning
behaviors can facilitate the learning process as well as what types of
questions are ineffective.
What
is a Good Question?
In
order to teach well, it is widely believed that one must be able to question
well. Asking good questions fosters interaction between the teacher and his/her
students. Rosenshine (1971) found that large amounts of student-teacher
interaction promotes student achievement. Thus, one can surmise that good
questions fosters student understanding. However, it is important to know that
not all questions achieve this.
Teachers
spend most of their time asking low-level 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.
High-level-cognitive
questions can be defined as questions that requires students to use higher
order thinking or reasoning skills. By using these skills, students do not
remember only factual knowledge. Instead, they use their knowledge to problem
solve, to analyze, and to evaluate. It is popularly believed that this type of
question reveals the most about whether or not a student has truly grasped a
concept. This is because a student needs to have a deep understanding of the
topic in order to answer this type of question. Teachers do not use
high-level-cognitive questions with the same amount of frequency as they do with
low-level-cognitive questions. Ellis (1993) claims that many teachers do rely
on low-level cognitive questions in order to avoid a slow-paced lesson, keep
the attention of the students, and maintain control of the classroom.
Arends
(1994) argues that many of the findings concerning the effects of using
lower-level-cognitive versus higher-level-cognitive questions has been
inconclusive. While some studies and popular belief favor asking
high-level-cognitive, other studies reveal the positive effects of asking
low-level cognitive questions. Gall (1984), for example, cited that
"emphasis on fact questions is more effective for promoting young
disadvantaged children's achievement, which primarily involves mastery of basic
skills; and emphasis on higher cognitive questions is more effective for
students of average and high ability. . ." (p. 41). Nevertheless, other
studies do not reveal any difference in achievement between students whose
teachers use mostly high level questions and those whose teachers ask mainly
low level questions (Arends, 1994; Wilen, 1991). Therefore, although teachers
should ask a combination of low-level-cognitive and high-level-cognitive
questions, they must determine the needs of their students in order to know
which sort of balance between the two types of questions needs to be made in
order to foster student understanding and achievement.
How
to ask questions that foster student achievement
In
a research review on questioning techniques, Wilen and Clegg (1986) suggest
teachers employ the following research supported practices to foster higher
student achievement:
- phrase
questions clearly;
- ask
questions of primarily an academic nature
- allow
three to five seconds of wait time after asking a question before
requesting a student's response, particularly when high-cognitive level
questions are asked;
- encourage
students to respond in some way to each question asked;
- balance
responses from volunteering and nonvolunteering students;
- elicit
a high percentage of correct responses from students and assist with
incorrect responses;
- probe
students' responses to have them clarify ideas, support a point of view,
or extend their thinking;
- acknowledge
correct responses from students and use praise specifically and
discriminately. (p. 23)
-
What
is a Bad Question?
When
children are hesitant to admit that they do not understand a concept, teachers
often try to encourage them to ask questions by assuring them that their
questions will neither be stupid or bad. Teachers frequently say that all questions
have some merit and can contribute to the collective understanding of the
class. However, the same theory does not apply to teachers. The content of the
questions and the manner in which teachers ask them determines whether or not
they are effective. Some mistakes that teachers make during the question and
answer process include the following: asking vague questions (ex. What did you
think of the story that we just read?), asking trick questions, and asking
questions that may be too abstract for children of their age (ex. asking a
kindergarten class the following question: How can it be 1:00 P.M. in
Connecticut but 6:00 P.M. in the United Kingdom at the same moment?)
When
questions such as those mentioned are asked, students will usually not know how
to respond and may answer the questions incorrectly. Thus, their feelings of
failure may cause them to be more hesitant to participate in class (Chuska,
1995), evoke some negative attitudes towards learning, and hinder the creation
of a supportive classroom environment.
Conclusion
Sanders
(1966) stated, "Good questions recognize the wide possibilities of thought
and are built around varying forms of thinking. Good questions are directed
toward learning and evaluative thinking rather than determining what has been
learned in a narrow sense" (p. ix). With this in mind, teachers must be
sure that they have a clear purpose for their questions rather than just
determining what knowledge is known. This type of question planning results in
designing questions that can expand student's knowledge and encourage them to
think creatively.
