Questions That Spark Curiosity Deb Haney and Maria Henry Villa Cresta Elementary

Objectives Participants will: Embrace curiosity to encourage questioning and critical and creative thinking Use questioning models and strategies to engage students in fluid and flexible thinking

Why do we ask questions? Assess students’ understanding of a concept To review and summarize lessons Determine what to reteach or teach next Spark conversation/ improve social skills Provide opportunities for students to ask questions which can lead to more sophisticated discussions.

Why should we strive to improve our questioning? Statistics show that most teachers ask an average of 300-400 questions on a daily basis. 60-80% of these questions are low-level questions that only require students to recall something they have already learned (Tienken, et al., 2010). Questions must be planned, structured, and systematic.

Why must curiosity come first Why must curiosity come first? When we are curious our brain is ready for learning and retention. Studies conducted by neuroscientists have found that asking stimulating relevant questions will increase students’ ability to learn.

Lower Level Questions… Require students to remember, reiterate, or find information in the text. Require students to simply recall what they have read or learned in a way which produces a “correct” or “incorrect” response. Set the stage for making sure students are ready for higher-level discussions.

Higher-Order Questions… Encourage critical thinking rather than “one right answer” Encourage more than one process for solving problems Require students to analyze, synthesize, evaluate, categorize, or apply what they have learned. Increase focus on metacognition. When students are able to tackle their own questioning, they are more likely to make meaning of a text, and make deeper connections (Walsh & Sattes, 2005).

REVISED Bloom’s Taxonomy Corresponding questions are: Innovative Evaluative Interpretive Factual CCSS: Integration of Knowledge and Ideas Craft and Structure Key Ideas and Details Lorin W. Anderson and David R. Krathwohl, 2001

Listen to the story “What Do You Do With An Idea Listen to the story “What Do You Do With An Idea?” by Kobi Yamada and work with your group to create 2 higher level questions that you could ask students. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSfNv0-SgJM

Ask higher-level thinking questions to focus, extend, and enrich learning and understanding: Convergent Divergent

Convergent Questions Usually require one correct, FACTUAL response Focus understanding of information or situations Lead to divergent questions

Divergent Questions encourage critical thinking – both interpretive and evaluative.

Types of Divergent Questions Quantity – Supposition – Point of View – Involvement – Forced Association – List All (Brainstorm) What if? Different Perspectives Personalization Synectics, analogies, metaphors

Learning to read is like learning to swim. Chucking a kid into the deep end without any help isn’t likely to teach him anything except to hate swimming. But no child ever learned to swim with his feet firmly planted on the bottom, either. The question is: What’s the right amount of struggle? Cory Turner, Common Core Reading: The Struggle over Struggle, 2014

What types of questions engage our students intellectually What types of questions engage our students intellectually? How do we encourage our students to think at a deeper level?

Remember to include higher level questions Now It’s Your Turn With your team: Choose 2 texts from upcoming ela units. Create a list of questions where you scaffold convergent to divergent questions. Remember to include higher level questions Select a recorder to type your questions and a reporter to share with us!