Encouraging Curiosity – Teaching Students to Ask Questions

http://www.101qs.com/1739

Mike Parrott, Science AST, Conyers School, Yarm. @DrP_Conyers

Harvard Education Letter - Volume 27, Number 5 - September/October 2011By DAN ROTHSTEIN and LUZ SANTANA

I keep six honest serving-men(They taught me all I knew);Their names are What and Why and When And How and Where and Who.

Rudyard Kipling

Starter

What was Kipling getting at?

My Process

Students generate questions based on the photo in groups on post-it notes.

Students then sort into open and closed questions

Students practice converting closed questions to open questions

Feedback some examples to the

class

Students prioritise their

top 5 questions

Students feedback an example and the reasons why it’s an important

question

Students attempt to answer the

questions based on further information

given to them

Final feedback on how many of the five were

answered and the answer to some of the

questions

My Reflection

» Students asked nearly all of the questions I would have liked them to ask

» Students asked some questions I would never have come up with (Why are all wind turbines white?)

» Students keen to look at the information to see if it answered their questions

» Students had the opportunity to reflect on the questioning process

» Leads naturally to the next step – what about those questions that weren’t answered?

We e-mailed Good Energy and got answers

to some of our unanswered questions

Further information

@Larryferlazzo on Twitter http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2012/05/23/the-best-posts-articles-about-asking-good-questions-help-me-find-more/

http://www.hepg.org/hel/printarticle/507

http://goo.gl/R8yOR

http://www.101qs.com/1739http://learningspy.co.uk/2011/09/24/questionable/