Post #4 What Questions Do We Ask? How Do We Ask?

In my opinion, a mark of a good teacher is that he or she engages students in the lesson. One of the most common ways to involve your students is to ask questions throughout the day. It is also one of the easiest, and sometimes laziest, ways. However, a carefully crafted question can get the whole class thinking and possibly even discussing different answers or solutions.

Maryellen Weimer suggests three ways to ask better questions in the classroom.  She proposes that teachers prepare questions ahead of time. If you think of what you want to ask, you can also prepare for possible answers that you may receive and how you would respond to them. Her second suggestion is to leave the question hanging for a while. Don't immediately respond positively just because one student figured it out. Let the rest of the class consider their answers for a while. This is a great way to engage the entire class and maybe even have them work together to figure out the answer. Finally, Dr. Weimer would like teachers to save the good questions and use them again in later classes. Using the student's responses to improve this question for the next class is also recommended.

Ben Johnson gives some more tips for asking questions in the classroom. I thoroughly enjoyed his point of view and sense of humor regarding this subject. The most important thing to remember when asking questions of a classroom is to be specific! Don't ask questions like, "Does everyone understand?" Think about what your goal is for each question that you ask. Mr. Johnson suggests that teachers ask the specific question that they have formulated before class, wait a few seconds to let everyone think about their answers, and then randomly choose a student to give his or her answer. This method engages the entire class. Everyone should be thinking of their answer just in case they are called upon.

Mr. Johnson's was my favorite article on the subject of asking questions. It was an easy read and also very informative. It was the one that got me thinking about how I would like to ask questions in my future classroom the most. My goal is to be the type of teacher that gets her students thinking for themselves, not just memorizing information. Crafting my questions appropriately is a great stepping stone towards that goal.