This Friday Gem comes from Steph Harel, who I saw use this sort of questioning in a lesson I observed.
She frequently asked questions that encouraged students to develop their own engagement with the learning, helping them think about the broader context of their learning, but also about what that learning means for them from an individual, personal, ethical as well as academic perspective.
I found these three questions from Steph particularly effective. They can be answered from different perspectives: personal/ethical/academic:
- “Why do we care about…?”
- “Are you surprised by…?”
- “Why does it matter…?”
This sort of questioning is effective because:
- It develops a student’s personal connection with topics: what do these topics mean to them as individuals. The learning resonates with them as thinking, feeling humans?
- It encourages students to interrogate their reactions to new ideas: great for metacognition.
- It helps the teacher build strong a strong rapport with the class, getting to know their students’ personal perspectives.
- Linking the academic work to a personal response will help the learning be contextualised for the individual. It will thus build it into a schema/network so it sticks in the long-term memory.
- It prompts debate and encourages student’s to raise their voice…if this is their opinion, they are less worried about being right or wrong.