Steph Harel, Acting Head of Geography at WHS, explores the journal article ‘Developing enquiry through questioning’
Wood, P. (2006) Developing enquiry through questioning. Teaching Geography, 31(2), 76-78.
“Any student wising to develop their capacity to enquire geographically requires a clear capacity to question” (Wood, 2006; p. 78).
Many classrooms, and even national strategies, focus on teachers as the main questioners; however, if students are to develop an independence in their work they must gain experiences which allow an opportunity to play a central role in framing questions of interest.
Wood accurately argues that students need to develop their questioning skills if they are to act as autonomous enquirers. His valuable exploration into different ‘levels’ of questioning in Geography highlights meaningful ways in which to support students to develop their own capacity for independent questioning:
1. Simple questioning: Simple questioning games can be used to develop and sharpen students’ questioning skills. For example, when revising a physical geography topic, students are given a post-it note with a keyword written on it, which they stick to their foreheads. Students then pose each other ‘yes’ ‘no’ questions to decipher which process they have been allocated.
2. Questions to compare: Students are asked to develop questions which will produce a clear and detailed comparison. For example, students studying tectonic hazards might explore two case studies, one from an AC and one from an LIDC, and are asked to compare their volcanic eruptions by posing questions. Importantly, students then reflect on why they have chosen their questions.
3. Questions to enquire: Wood uses an example of a KS3 class, who recently completed a unit on agriculture. Students were prompted to consider the underlying patterns and processes they studied and asked to formulate five questions they would use to investigate the agriculture of India. For example, “How does landscape and climate affect farming in India”? I was particularly struck by Wood’s focus on the importance of recognising that enquiry questions can lead to ‘dead-end’ responses, and that learning and understanding is not a simple or linear process.
4. Questions to research: When students have developed a questioning capability, they can be given a large amount of autonomy in both framing and researching questions. Wood explores this idea in KS5 Geography teaching, with students studying the global economy. Students were offered a new context in which to explore the changing economic fortunes of two contrasting locations and the opportunity to decide on questions they felt were pertinent to ask. The process culminated in a written report, which demonstrated deep and critical understanding of the information researched.
As an educator, it is my belief that the geography classroom is an ideal environment for developing the use of self-questioning. I found huge value in Wood’s article, which argues that it is crucial that teachers not only learn how to pose their own questions to greatest effect, but also guide and support students in developing their own enquiries about the world around them. “By focusing on the student as questioner, we can help them become more active, reflective learners, and this can only help in developing active, critical classrooms where quality geography [my emphasis] can blossom” (Wood, 2006; p. 78).
Alexa Cutteridge, Head of Curriculum PE and Assistant Head of Year 7, gives a short review of ‘The Coaching Habit Say Less, Ask more & Change the Way you Lead Forever’ by Michael Bungay Stanier
“We live in the world our questions create.” (David Cooperrider)
“The minute we begin to think we have all the answers, we forget the questions.” (Madeleine L’Engle)
“Get comfortable with silence”
“Without a good question, a good answer has no place to go” (Clayton, Christensen)
–
As a PE teacher, I have spent most of my professional career practically coaching on the sports field, but I have been on a journey to bring coaching techniques to my leadership roles, and apparently, I am not alone! As noted in the book, Daniel Goleman (psychologist and journalist who popularised the concept of emotional intelligence) suggested that coaching is one of the six essential leadership styles, but is one of the least used as many leaders claim to not have time to practise it. Stanier guides you through easy ways to change your leadership behaviour, to incorporate a coaching style in a way that you do ‘a little more asking people questions and a little less telling people what to do.’ Stanier considers that it is not initially an easy concept to increase questioning and so he helpfully outlines how to change, before looking at what to change.
The seven coaching habit questions are:
The Kickstarter Question – ‘What’s on your mind?’ the way to start any conversation in a way that is both focused and open.
The Awe Question – the best coaching question in the world – ‘And what else?’ This works as a self-management tool for you, and as a boost for the 6 other questions.
The Focus Question – ‘What is the real challenge for you here?’ This question helps you slow down so you can solve real problems and not just the first problem.
The Foundation Question – ‘What do you want?’ This allows you to identify the needs of an individual and get a better understanding how you can support them.
The Lazy Question – ‘How can I help?’ This helps cut right to the request and additionally it stops you from leaping into action unnecessarily.
The Strategic Question – ‘If you’re saying yes to this, what are you saying no to?’ This allows the people you are working with to be fully committed to their yes and aware of the no’s which will create the space and energy for the yes to happen.
The Learning Question – ‘What was most useful for you?’ This works with the Kickstarter question to make the Coaching Bookends. It helps to ensure that everyone finds their interactions with you even more helpful.In the educational arena, applying the coaching habit and the simple, yet powerful seven questions, has the potential to positively transform the leadership of Teachers, Heads of Departments, Pastoral Leaders, Senior Management or even pupils on Student Leadership Team. After reading this book, it is important to highlight that I do not think we need to do away with the leaderships styles we already have, but merely bring the coaching habit questions into the mix, in a way that works for us. How does that sound?
Teaching and learning Gem #22 – 1 on 1 Questioning
This Friday Gem comes from Dan Addis and the Classics department
In Classics we get the opportunity to have 1 on 1 academic opportunities that many other subjects do not, and so I thought it a good opportunity to highlight a few principles of 1 on 1 academic discussion as well as including some universal questions that can be used for every topic, whether it is something you are well read on or not. The principles are very similar to normal student questioning but I hope this might help encourage some staff who are not as comfortable with 1 on 1s to have a go. Apologies if it feels very rudimentary!
General principles of 1 on 1 questioning
Make sure body language is relaxed and open. By maintaining an open relaxed pose it becomes a fun conversation rather than an intense grilling. Combine this with nodding and smiling at points to encourage the student to continue.
Allow the student to finish their point completely. If you think of something you would like to ask, jot it down and ask later with reference back to the point they were making. By finding a link between a later topic and the previous point you can help the students connect differing aspects of their study.
Don’t be afraid of asking the student to repeat their point in a different way if you didn’t understand. This is good practice for them to think of other methods of explanation, and should be done on occasion even if they have made themselves clear.
Like with much questioning, don’t feel the need to fill the silence. It will become more awkward quickly, but due to it being 1 on 1 the student is likely to relent and make a point which you can expand upon.
Some questions to ask students that will always be relevant and useful:
Can you simplify your point into a single sentence/How would you explain this to a child? (Very useful for them to break it down to more simple terms on which you can expand)
Are there any other perspectives you have read into this that you disagree with? Why?
Why do you think the terminology is used? Would you change the wording and how?
Can you think about how this links to other things you have learnt, in this subject and others?
What do you think is the next step? (Either for the author or research or the curriculum)
Which elements of this did you find difficult to understand?
Where would you like to take this further?
Do you think there is a problematic background to this topic? How might you challenge this?
We hope you get the opportunity for some 1 on 1s in the future!
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.
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”.
Creating physical gestures with aspects of understanding so that questions can be done using physical gestures rather than words.
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.
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)
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 focuson 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
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!
Dr Anna Field, teacher of History at WHS, explores an article from the journal Teaching History and how dialogue in the classroom can create layers of historical understanding
‘1069 and all that: the dialogic understanding of the Norman legacy in Chester’, Teaching History 175 (June 2019)
“…dialogue can be harnessed in the classroom and enable students to create meaningful connections between factual, conceptual, and contextual knowledge.”
Bird and Wilson’s impressive study investigates the role of classroom dialogue in the production and application of historical knowledge across a three-lesson Y8 enquiry on the Norman legacy in Chester. Using methods from sociocultural psychology, the authors argue that the students’ historical knowledge both shapes, and is shaped by, dialogic interaction in the classroom. How this is achieved, they contend, remains an understudied area. While the article’s focus is on classroom dialogue as a whole rather than questioning per se, the authors’ examples of classroom exchange demonstrate the importance of teacher questioning in the creation of explicit and tacit historical knowledge. The result is a carefully planned a well-executed consideration of the interaction between different levels of historical knowledge in KS3 pupils, which further suggests how dialogue can be harnessed in the classroom and enable students to create meaningful connections between factual, conceptual, and contextual knowledge. The authors largely succeed in their aim to shed light on the different ways to create these links.
According to Bird and Wilson, dialogue stimulates interaction and movement between layers of factual, conceptual, and contextual knowledge and thus promotes historical understanding. In the first enquiry lesson, the process gauging students’ knowledge unearthed misconceptions surrounding chronology. While the students could make inferences, it was clear to the teachers that deeper knowledge did not yet underpin those inferences, and was not yet at their ‘fingertips’ during class discussion. Transcripts of dialogue from the next two lessons demonstrated the importance of teacher questioning – ‘probing’ – in how students started to evaluate significance and generate collective knowledge. Teacher questions were guided by student inferences, using an open format that encourages students to use their explicit historical knowledge – facts, dates, events – to develop a tacit understanding of the ideas and beliefs that sources from this period reveal. The trajectory of questions can be traced from ‘wow, tell us more! What we learn from this’; to ‘how can we learn that information [from the sources]?’; to ‘why were they [the Normans] smart?’.
These questions generated a ‘moment of contingency’ in one pupil that guided the whole class to read the primary texts in a specific way. The authors showed that these interactions fostered a deeper and verbally explicit connection between ‘layers’ of historical understanding in the individual and the wider group. In the words of Bird and Wilson ‘in this way knowledge becomes dynamic, changing and flexibly understood rather than inert, static and brittle’, a key quotation which demonstrates the contribution their study makes to History education pedagogy.
Nazlee Haq, teacher of Maths at WHS, looks at the book Teaching Backwards and what it says about the teacher as detective and the power of metacognitive questioning
“Over a series of lessons, students should be asked metacognitive questions. These can be posed at any point in the lesson.”
Reduced face-to-face contact with students due to Covid-19 restrictions has highlighted how vital it is to get questioning right in the classroom to assess students’ understanding of the curriculum.
In ‘Teaching Backwards’ we learn that questioning is a tool for “looking for proof of learning”. The role of the teacher detective is to establish the quality and depth of learning that has taken place over a period of teaching. Teachers should also be able to forecast the types of questions students will ask, using the lesson plan as a prompt to do so.
As a teacher you know what you want your students to have learned by the end of the lesson, so that when they are assessed they can demonstrate a clear understanding of the concepts.
The right questions can act as proof as to whether students are on the right track to understanding content. Questions can take several forms:
To check for weak understanding
To create deliberate confusion to see how students deal with the challenge, although this tangential approach may not be appropriate for all students
Ask students to provide evidence for their answers
Help teachers to understand whether the students’ thinking process is robust and on track or not
Initial questions might be open, but also require students to provide support for their verbal answers. For example, “Tell me what you have learned so far about …..?” followed by, “Can you provide evidence for ….?”. By setting this type of expectation in questioning students, Hattie argues that teachers establish academic rigour in the classroom.
However, others have argued individual, pair, group or whole class that giving students ‘wait time’ is also valuable. By giving this allocated time students become increasingly skilled at giving detailed answers, enhancing the quality of their reflection.
Over a series of lessons, students should be asked metacognitive questions. These can be posed at any point in the lesson.
At the start, ‘Have you seen a problem like this before?’. Or during, ‘What part of this is easy/difficult to explain to someone else?’ and ‘What stages are crucial in explaining this concept?’ At the end, ‘How will you remember this learning?’ or ‘If you did this again, how could you do it better?’
I particularly liked this last set of questions as they prompt students to think about how they are working through problems.
Mrs Hattie Franklin, Head of Year 12 and Oxbridge Coordinator (Arts and Humanities), explores what learning at Oxbridge entails and how the Oxbridge and Academic Scholarship programmes can help WHS students with their applications and developing their attitude to their own intellectual curiosity and passions.
Oxford and Cambridge are two of the oldest and most famous universities in the world, ranked at the top of the league tables and justifiably revered for nurturing academia across all disciplines. The undergraduate offering is a world class education and students from all over the globe vie for places in the hope of gaining a well-respected degree which unlocks opportunities in life after university. The myths surrounding the interview process are legendary, the pace of the teaching is fast, demanding and rewarding, the co-curricular offering is rich, and some of the traditions are just a little quirky. But, with competition for places more intense than ever and no guarantee of a successful application, it can be an intimidating challenge to take on. So, I would like to talk through an overview of an Oxbridge education in this article and explain why it is perhaps a little more accessible than you might think.
What kind of thinker are you?
Are you naturally curious, question what you learn in lessons and enjoy debating hot topics with your peers and your teachers? Do you live by the Socratic maxim that ‘the unexamined life is not worth living for mankind’? If so, the Oxbridge teaching model might well suit you. The core teaching for each subject is based around conversations, normally between two or three students and their tutor, who is an expert on that topic. These are called tutorials (Oxford) or supervisions (Cambridge), and they offer a chance to talk in-depth about a topic and to receive individual feedback on your work. To prepare for each meeting with their tutor, students will have read the books on the reading list and prepared an essay a week, or sometimes, two. There is also a requirement to attend lectures, seminars and classes on a weekly basis to supplement learning. Terms are shorter than other universities’ and are only 8 weeks long which means that preparatory work for each term is set for the preceding holiday and examined in the week before term officially begins. So, in addition to strong academic ability, you need to have mastered those important study skills of organisation and time management and be motivated to study independently.
How do I know if it’s the right thing for me?
There is no typical Oxbridge student and no single experience. Students who are passionate about their subject, diligent, driven and, most of all, have a love of academic exploration are already embodying many of the qualities necessary to apply and to succeed. It is never too early to embrace academic excellence and WHS has a varied and exciting Academic Scholarship programme to inspire pupils at every Key Stage, including Rosewell and Explore lectures, subject societies and academic extension clubs, WimTalks and Symposia, masterclasses and more informal discussion groups such as the hugely popular Tea and T’inking. In our new STEAM tower, and through our STEAM+ initiative, we have a brilliant new space specifically designed to help ingenuity to flourish and allow creative experimentation in inter-disciplinary learning. The scholarship programme is a warmly inclusive one: a desire to challenge oneself and venture into new areas of interest are the only criteria for involvement. More on our WHS offering across the school can be found in Mr Addis’s blog here https://wakelet.com/wake/amIaQ4T3b_jPHEuEUGf3v
Above: Sixth Formers studying in the Common Room
I’ve decided to apply: now what?
Every student who decides to apply for Oxbridge will have access to individual and group support as part of the Oxbridge preparation programme. The programme is officially launched in the Spring Term of Year 12 and we assign students a mentor in their subject, with whom they will meet regularly to discuss and develop their areas of interest. The best candidates drive their own mentoring sessions, bringing ideas to the table and challenging themselves to think around their subject. Importantly, it should not feel like ‘extra’ work but an opportunity to explore areas that have particularly piqued your interest in lessons. A favourite author, a specific and niche period of History, a passion for Greek tragedy or a love of linguistics: there are no set boundaries and the world of academia really is your metaphorical oyster!
The application process
Oxbridge applications need to be submitted earlier than other universities, and students will need to finalise their Personal Statements in the summer holiday of Year 12, ready to review and send to UCAS before October half term. You will focus also in the Autumn term of Year 13 on preparing for any aptitude test and, if invited for one, your interview.
Urban myths abound about the ‘dreaded’ Oxbridge interview: as I prepared for my own, I was horrified to be told stories of the naïve student who was asked to throw a brick through a (closed) window or the hopeful who, when asked by the interviewing don to ‘surprise me!’, set fire to his interviewer’s newspaper with unfortunate consequences. The reality for me was a very accessible and interesting conversation about Medea and other Euripides plays, which I had nominated in the interview as my specialist subject, a few difficult questions to prompt lateral and dynamic thinking, and absolutely no requests to destroy any element of my tutor’s study.
Interviews can be unnerving: they are, by and large, a new experience in an unfamiliar place but your interviewer is on your side and will not expect you to be a global expert on your A level subject. At interview, the best candidates present their ability, interest and potential, and are encouraged to apply their knowledge to new problems.
You will be expected to engage in an intense academic conversation to allow you show what you know but also to demonstrate that you would flourish in a tutorial-style learning environment. There will be a few unexpected questions; primarily to stop you reciting your carefully learned, heftily rhetorical speech on why Homer is the best poet that the world has ever seen (He is. But your interviewer also knows that). Thinking hard, pausing to collect yourself, being measured, coherent and eloquent in your responses are all components of a good interview which will hopefully be enjoyed by both sides. With regards to preparation, practice is key to help you acclimatise to nerves and think quickly and logically, so do take advantage of any opportunities organized by the school and independently if you can.
Above: Year 12 Science
Fortes fortuna adiuvat
The highly competitive nature of the application process and the extra effort involved proves to be too much of a gamble for some. In addition, on review of the courses available, other students conclude that their dream university course is not to be found at Oxford or Cambridge. However, pupils who are confident, highly academic and have an intrinsic love of learning should certainly seek advice about Oxbridge application from the teacher of their favourite subject or the WHS Sixth Form Team. Whatever the outcome, the experience of an application will be an intellectually enriching and stimulating one, and it could result in three or four years of an unforgettable undergraduate educational experience.
Moreover, in addition to the academic experience, Oxford and Cambridge also both offer a vast range of activities to be enjoyed outside of tutorials, from debating in the Oxford Union to the Cambridge Footlights; from college choirs to becoming a sporting Blue; plus many of the usual student societies. Do contact me or Mrs Nicolas (for STEM subjects) or myself if you would like to find out more.
And one final word of advice about that interview: do have something in your arsenal which does not involve arson itself, on the off-chance that a world expert actually does ask you to ‘surprise them’…
This Friday Gem comes from Priscilla Abeelack who shared this idea with the Geography and Economics department.
The teacher starts by posing a question. At the end the teacher says “Popcorn + student name”
That student then responds fully and then asks another related/development question to take the discussion further. The student says “Popcorn + student name”
Or the student asks another question that is unrelated, for a good bit of interleaving!
And so on…until the whole class has been ‘popcorned’.
The teacher could start with something very ‘small’ and see how ‘wide’ the discussion goes, or vice versa; or the teacher could start on one topic, and see whether students can move to another topic through their questioning.
This would also be relevant for languages and other subjects to consolidate new vocabulary or terminologies. For example, ‘define …’, ‘what is the formula for …?’, ‘Explain one effect of …’, ‘Explain one cause of …’.
Popcorn questions is effective because:
It helps students create networks of ideas, proven to strengthen storage in long-term memory.
It could be useful in revisiting past material (interleaving!).
It requires students to really listen to each other and to respond appropriately.
It encourages a questioning mindset for students, identifying ways to develop and deepen discussion through asking questions.
It puts the responsibility on the students to shape the discussion – they are not reliant on the teachers.
It encourages students to take ownership of their learning and classroom experience.
Teaching and learning Gem #18 – Guest Edited by AFB – the problem with interrupting the pause
Following on from Isabelle’s gems about questioning, and the need to pause…
We have also been discussing what interrupting that pause might actually do.
Why do we interrupt a pause?
We teach in a bubbly, vibrant school. We are not used to silence in the classroom. It’s a bit awkward.
We move around our topics and texts fairly swiftly, and are not always comfortable with slowing down.
We want to help. If we feel awkward, how awkward must THEY feel? I know, we’ll turn the question around! Changing the word order will not only help them understand the question better, but it will break the awkward feeling!!
INCORRECT!
Jumping in, to ‘help’ a student, or to break a silence might relieve someone, sometime. But it is also likely to:
confuse
or disorientate the thoughts about the first question
or embarrass by drawing attention to the pause
or even patronise by perceiving a problem where there isn’t one
Mrs Wei Fang, teacher of Mandarin at WHS, reflects on her own experience of questioning in the classroom, before reviewing a blog post by Kris Boulton ‘Should we use questions to teach?’
“…the question is not why questions are better, it is when.”
As a language teacher, I have been thinking a lot about questioning in the classroom, getting students to really think about the grammar and vocabulary they learnt, in order to improve their understanding and memorising. For example, ‘how’ questions are particularly useful in assisting students to remember Chinese characters, or hanzi: ‘How do you know the meaning of this character?’ Students would answer: It means juice 汁 because it has water radical氵 (the components of characters that indicate meaning). I then would retrieve other learning from their long-term memory by asking an elaboration question: ‘Where else can you see this radical?’. Giving students the thinking time, asking them to connect their learning and expecting a better answer are very important strategies of questioning.
However, questions do not always go well. At times I asked a series of questions and felt like my questions were much longer than the students’ answer. They seemed to be confused about why I asked those questions. I then reflected on my lesson and realised that: why didn’t I just explain it?
So, it is time to think about why we ask questions. Kristopher Boulton argues that questions are not necessarily better than explanations, though sometimes he switches to questions when he feels the need to promote understanding. In his blog post ‘Should we use questions to teach? -1&2”, he addresses that the question is not why questions are better, it is when. He concluded that: ‘questions can be very effective tools of teaching, but they must be used with incredible care.’ A very structured grid of various question types concluded by him and another blogger can be found here:
Question Spectrum
The above matrix is made for Maths, but one can be also useful for other subjects. It brought to my attention the pointlessness of allowing students to guess without establishing their prior knowledge. In Mandarin, there is language content that is better to be explicitly taught first, especially the content that doesn’t exist in English, for example: tones, measure words, characters (not randomly drawing it but with certain orders), as well as unique culture conception such as Hukou (a system of household registration used in China), etc. In order to enhance understanding, I once asked year 7 students to analyse the tones, by asking them the differences between Chinese and English sounds. As a result of lacking enough input of Chinese, some students were struggling to tell the differences among the four tones. They told me that the rising and turning tones sound the same. In this case, further questions on this will confuse them. It made all the difference the next time when I made them practice tones for enough time, and then asked them to tell me which tones they have heard and why (verbalizing burgeoning understanding). A key quotation from Boulton that I keep in mind for my subject is ‘never ask pupils questions to which they have not already been told the answer, unless they know enough that answering the question requires them only inching forwards.’
addresses that the question is not why questions are better, it is when. He concluded that: ‘questions can be very effective tools of teaching, but they must be used with incredible care.’ A very structured grid of various question types concluded by him and another blogger can be found here: