We talk at length about student learning, what we want students to learn, how we will approach delivering instruction and how we will know whether students have learned, but in the end it all comes back to whether students have acquired the knowledge and skills that we intended. How do we know and how do we get them there? I believe the answer lies in effective questioning. There are multiple ways to deliver instruction, but the key to all of them is using questioning techniques that guide students’ thinking in the direction we intend and ultimately show us the students’ grasp of the subject matter. Questioning is what we do!

Teachers ask questions in their classrooms every day, but are these questions the right kind of questions? As I work with teachers doing instructional coaching, one of the major instructional goals that teachers identify as an area to work on is better student engagement. Teachers are often surprised to learn that the kinds of questions they are asking lead to student engagement issues. Many times, teachers are asking a multitude of questions, but most of these are very low-level “who, what, where” kinds of questions meant to check knowledge or clarify and do little to stimulate student thinking. In fact, many of these questions are questions that the students know the answers to already or can guess without any thought or preparation whatsoever, so students’ minds are not engaged even if they are not being disruptive and are paying attention. The teachers, however, feel that these questions are necessary to assess the students’ knowledge of the material. So what is the solution? 

Jim Knight in his book, High Impact Instruction [Corwin, 2013], suggests that five or six big questions in a 90-minute class is enough and obviously an even smaller number in a shorter class will be needed. A teacher can create a few well-designed questions for a lesson that will lead to student thinking and conversation. The teacher then interjects clarifying questions as needed to fill in the gaps, but most of the knowledge students’ gain will become apparent through the discussion that results from the question. These questions allow students to frame answers from each of their own perspectives and gives them a chance to demonstrate knowledge in a much deeper way than a simple answer would. The majority of these kinds of questions will not have a single correct answer but will have multiple approaches and opportunities for applying knowledge. Teachers must have an accurate idea of the knowledge, skills and standards that they are looking for as a part of the conversations and must be prepared to insert ideas that may be missed as part of student discussion. Teachers must also be prepared to bring student conversations back on topic if answers begin to stray from the original question. This must be done carefully without prompting student answers but still directing discussion in the direction it needs to go.

As teachers, we ask questions. It’s what we do! The next time you’re looking for good questions and perhaps feeling overwhelmed trying to come up with enough of them or at least good ones, consider creating fewer but higher quality questions that put the conversation back in the hands of your students. You may find that not only does student engagement as well as depth of knowledge and skills increase, but your job as a teacher in using questioning techniques may actually get easier at the same time it gets better!