The Importance of Good Questions

Asking children questions is an essential part of teaching and learning practice at the British school of Guangzhou. During the course of any week, teachers will ask dozens, if not hundreds, of questions designed to provoke deeper thinking around lesson content and subject areas in all parts of the school.

It was Socrates who believed good questioning as part of dialogue would encourage higher order thinking and promote learning. However, for questioning to be effective it has to be carefully thought through, relevant and well-structured. At BSG, questioning is engaging and, importantly, something that children respond to willingly. Questioning must also have a purpose, most obviously as part of a conversation and as adults, it is important that we respond thoughtfully to children’s answers to give meaning to their responses. Our teachers know that a poor adult response to a student’s answer will lead to poor answers in the future. BSG teachers incorporate question preparation in their lesson planning and key questions are regularly discussed during staff meetings.

So what makes a great question? Here are a few of the considerations used by our teachers that could be incorporated into your conversations with children or young people in the car on the way home, over dinner, or whenever you are reflecting on learning with your child:

1. Try keeping questions open, avoiding ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers. An open question allows the child to answer in as long or short form as they feel able. Don’t worry if answers start shorter – if you consistently ask open questions, children will quickly see that there are no right or wrong answers, but an opportunity to open a discussion with you. Examples of ‘open’ questions would be ‘What did you learn about insects today?’ (A closed question would be ‘How many legs does a spider have?’) or ‘What do you think Hamlet would use the internet for?’ The great thing about open questions is they naturally develop a conversation. So:
   
   
2. We always respond to an answer. This sends the message to children and young people that we are genuinely interested in their answer. In our classrooms, we often encourage another student to build on previous answers: to develop or refine ideas. An answer that is passed around can grow and becomes more powerful with each addition. If there are just two of you in your conversation, you could encourage the development of an answer with ‘So, that would mean…?’ We try to avoid correcting an answer if we can, rather develop the child’s reasoning until they realise their first response was inaccurate.
   
   
3. We give students time to think before responding to good questions. The best answers are rarely the first or fastest ones. You could call these something like ‘Thinking Questions’ and make sure your child knows you are not expecting a fast answer. At the same time, challenge instant responses you feel are incomplete with ‘Really? Tell me why…’
   
   
4. We will vary our questioning strategies, and make sure to include some questioning games that are fun. Good questioning does not have to be a test of knowledge or memory, or does not have to appear so all of the time. One fun approach is the ‘I went to market, and I bought a ….’ game where each of you tries to think of an object linked to the topic under discussion in alphabetical order, in turn. Returning to the insect topic, ‘I went to market and bought an ant / bee / caterpillar / dragonfly / earwig…etc’. Another fun strategy is the ‘What if…’ question: ‘What if birds could talk?’ or ‘What if time travel was real?’, ‘What if you were an explorer? What would you explore now?’
   
   
5. To keep questions relevant, BSG teachers plan key questions, and we would encourage parents to do the same. Do read our newsletters and weekly bulletins, so you know what your child has been/will be learning about in school. We know that unplanned questions are most likely to be ‘low level’ ones that focus on recall rather than higher order thinking, so have a great question in mind to start the conversation.

We know that great habits build if they are consistent, so if approaches to questioning are similar at home to school, we are giving our children and young people the best Socratic education, and think what they could do with that!