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Teaching and learning Gem #21 – Kinaesthetic questioning

This Friday Gem comes from Dan Addis and the Classics department


There are several different ways you can incorporate some physical movement into your questioning of students.

  1. Simple use of physical movement in multiple choice questioning. Simply labelling each direction as an A or O you can ask the students to hold their hands straight in the air and lean to the side they think is correct and say either “AAYYY” or “OOOH”.
  2. Creating physical gestures  with aspects of understanding so that questions can be done using physical gestures rather than words.
    1. E.g. Mark Wilmore connects the Latin verb endings to a physical gesture “-o = I (thumb pointing at own chest), -s= you (s) (finger pointing away), -t = he/she/it (thumb pointing to the side)”. The question then can be asked or answered by gesture rather than vocally.
    2. E.g. Catriona Irvine adopts a pose connected with the meaning behind a grammatical point (Superman pose for the Subject doing the action and crossed arms for Object receiving the action)
    3. This can also be used to prompt students in their answers and to help model correct answers for students.

Kinaesthetic questioning is effective because

  • It helps students strengthen storage in long-term memory, as the variety can help increase the number of neural pathways connected to certain aspects of knowledge.
  • It helps interleaving as it is a quick and easy way to start or end a lesson to remember previous material.
  • It requires students to focus on the front of the class rather than at their device, which helps ensure engagement in the lesson.
  • It helps all students focus, especially those with ADHD, by adding a physical component, especially important in KS3 groups where they are not moving around between lessons
  • In example 1. It helps students stretch their lumbar area and helps improve posture.
  • It encourages students who don’t want to speak up to demonstrate their knowledge, as well as allow for easier assessment of knowledge in the group.
  • It’s FUN! Fun to do, fun to watch. Just generally fun.

Points to bear in mind

  1. Ensure students understand the rules and boundaries you want in place before such activity. They will get excited but if the rules aren’t clear they can become raucous.

We hope you enjoy some physicality in your lessons!

Dan Addis and the Classics Department