Elicitation Techniques

Questioning is the most effective activation technique used in teaching, mainly within initiation-Response- feedback pattern. In many situations, the teacher uses different types of utterance (a statement, an incomplete sentence or an order) to elicit an oral response from the student(s). In other words, the teacher’s questions are not always realized by interrogatives. Questioning

The teacher asks questions for many reasons: ― To check the students’ understanding. ― To encourage them to be more active. ―To elicit some information from the students(facts, ideas, opinions………etc). ―To stimulate thinking. ―To involve them in teaching (make them participate in the presentation of new items). ―To review and practice previously known items.

―To encourage self-expression. ―To draw their attention to a certain topic. ―To provide a certain input via a good student ( the teacher should not always be the source of information in the class). What kinds of questions can you ask your students? Questions have been classified according to various criteria or variables: whether they are” thinking level the teacher tries to develop, whether they are closed or open-ended.

Display and genuine questions:  Display questions: are those, which the teacher asks. Yet, he knows their answers in advance. Display questions have other objectives; e.g. pointing out that the student has done something wrong: —What are you doing, Nadein? The student, here, feels that she is about to be in trouble for doing ‘nothing’. Display questions

—Are you a student? The teacher directs the student’s attention that her behavior is not accepted from a student. Genuine questions: the teacher really wants to know a certain answer; he elicits information from the student(s): ―Have you been to Alex, before? ―What did you see there? ―What can you see in this picture? Genuine questions

Closed and open-ended questions Closed questions require a single right answer. The student is usually involved in convergent thinking collecting previously-learned information or reorganizing it in order to reach to one correct answer. In so doing, he recalls prior knowledge. In some cases, the students are required to analyze this information or apply it to solve a certain problem; some problems need convergent thinking leading them to any one solution. Closed questions

Open-ended questions, on the other hand, have different right answers. Many answers are possible. They lead to divergent thinking. Divergent thinking includes evaluative questions and other questions that require imagination and creativity, e.g., —What might have happened if the world is one country? Open-ended questions

Question forms Linguistically, questions are classified into: 1-Yes / No questions: Is this a picture? 2-Or questions: Was he born in London or Egypt? 3-Wh- questions: They begin with Who, What, Whom, Whose, Which, Where, When, Why, How….etc. 4-Question-tags or tag questions: You are a student, aren’t you?

Guidelines for effective questioning: Your questions should be clear, in the sense that the learners can immediately grasp what the question means and what kind of answer is required. Therefore, when the teacher asks a question and has no response, he should use alternative question; simpler. He can simplify the question by putting in into other words or breaking it into simpler questions.

If your students provide inappropriate responses, avoid passive reactions; the students should be sure that their responses will be dealt with respect and will not be put down even if they say something inappropriate. ―Don’t ignore partly correct answers. You should refer to the correct part and identify the incorrect part in a positive way; you can say: That’s almost right. Can you now listen to another answer?

—Don’t be ridiculous when a student provides incorrect response. Help him to save face without accusing him of being lazy or stupid. You can reply in different ways: No, that’s not correct, but I’m glad you mentioned it. No, that’s not what I want, but it is an important point. ―Direct your questions to the whole class instead of individual pupils. After asking a question, pause briefly and then name a pupil. In this way, everyone has a chance to think in the question.