Questioning is, first and foremost, one of the most
important tools a teacher has when conducting a lesson. Questions however, like
all good lessons, must be carefully structured and planned so as to be highly
effective. I have come to understand, through actual teaching experience, just
how valuable a properly structured question can be and, conversely, how
wasteful and even counterproductive a poorly structured question is. Throughout
my journey as an evolving teacher, I have been working tirelessly at creating
more valuable, effective, and meaningful questions that I know will elicit
thoughtful and appropriate responses form my students. While I can safely say
that my questions have improved since I first began my student teaching
experience a couple of months ago, there is still plenty of more room for
improvement. For example, according to Bloom’s Taxonomy, there are multiple
levels of questions. The lowest forms of questions lie within the
“Comprehension” or “Remember” category, in which the teacher may ask questions
that require students to simply regurgitate memorized material. The higher
categories of the taxonomy however, require a great deal more critical and
analytical thinking. Questioning categories like “Evaluate” or “Create” on
Bloom’s Taxonomy require students to do far more in order to effectively answer
any given question and these are the categories I strive for in every lesson.
Obviously, not every question that I ask my students can possibly fall in to
these higher categories, nor should they. The most important thing to remember
regarding Bloom’s Taxonomy is that the teacher should utilize every category,
from “Remember” to “Create” and everything in between. What I try to avoid, and
what any good teacher should try to avoid, is spending too much of my
questioning time in the lower categories of the taxonomy without ever really
breeching the higher levels of questioning and thinking.
In
order to improve my own questioning strategies, I always make sure to plan at
least a great deal of my questions for the lesson while lesson planning. I have
found that my questions are often far more effective when I have spent time
before the lesson constructing them carefully rather than always coming up with
them on the spot. I also make sure to use certain words in my questions that I
know will help elicit more meaningful responses from students. Every category
on Bloom’s Taxonomy has certain key words that often appear in the questions
that fit in to that particular questioning level. For example, questions that
fall in to the “Analyze” category often have words like “analyze,” “compare,” “contrast,”
and “infer” within the questions themselves. I am always sure to consult my list
of key words and questioning levels when constructing questions, so as to ensure
that the actual wording of my questions is helping accomplish what I am setting
out to accomplish. Another incredibly important procedure that I am constantly trying
to improve is wait time. Essentially, wait time is the amount of time a teacher
chooses to wait for a student response after asking a question. While a teacher’s
first impulse is often to quickly move on after asking a student a question, adequate
wait time ensures that the teacher is giving the student enough time to first construct
a meaningful response before answering the question. As I continue on my journey
as a teacher, I hope that I may continue to improve my questioning strategies
with the help of a few of the aforementioned techniques discussed above.
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