Robert Marzano, in his newly published Questioning Sequences in the Classroom,
makes the argument that the exact same question can require Higher Order Thinking for one student
but Lower Order Thinking for
another. He gives the example of this question:
Why is it that tides are equally high on
both sides of the earth when the moon’s gravity is pulling from only one side?
If
the student has not been exposed to this line of reasoning before, to arrive at
a plausible answer, he or she must go through a complex thinking process in
order to analyze the impact of the moon’s gravity and earth’s gravity and
resulting force and counterforce. No
doubt about it: This requires higher level thinking. But if the student has heard or read the
explanation before and stored the information in long-term memory, it would be
a simple act of recall to respond correctly to the question.
This
creates a dilemma: How do you ask questions that keep all student working and
thinking?
The
solution, according to Marzano, is to use Questioning
Sequences, rather than single questions.
His research, which is always impeccable, verifies that using a sequence
of questions will elicit deeper and more rigorous thinking in students. In his book, Marzano goes into great detail about
why sequencing questions works so well.
He also gives exemplars from multiple content areas and makes
suggestions of how to successfully incorporate questioning sequences into your
classroom.
If
reading a full book right now seems overwhelming, save it for the summer. But you could still experiment yet this year.
A Place to Start
One
alternative that you could implement today is to use the questions listed below. This poster from Edutopia is trending right
now on educational Twitter channels and looks great. Try using these “Five Simple Questions” and explore
the impact they have on your students’ thinking and learning if you used them
in sequence.
 |
| From Rebecca Alber, Consulting Online Editor, Edutopia, April 2014 |
Using
questioning sequences is a doable, simple, concrete approach to
questioning. You can implement this
strategy today with almost no training. Give
it a try—and let me know your results.
No
question about it, HSE, I hope you have a great week.
Bring
it home strong!
Phil
“Effective questioning brings
insight, which fuels curiosity, which cultivates wisdom.”
--Chip Bell
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