Mentor materials
High-quality classroom talk and questioning
Intended outcomes
The intended outcomes of this topic are for Early Career Teachers to:
Learn that:
- Questioning is an essential tool for teachers; questions can be used for many purposes, including to check pupils’ prior knowledge, assess understanding and break down problems.
- High quality classroom talk can support pupils to articulate key ideas, consolidate understanding and extend their vocabulary.
Learn how to stimulate pupil thinking and check for understanding, by:
- Including a range of types of questions in class discussions to extend and challenge pupils (e.g. by modelling new vocabulary or asking pupils to justify answers).
- Providing appropriate wait time between question and response where more developed responses are required.
Activities
Why we use questioning (5 minutes)
Read the following to the ECT:
Students need to practise new material. The teacher’s questions and student discussion are a major way of providing this necessary practice. The most successful teachers [...] spend more than half the time lecturing, demonstrating, and asking questions.
Questions allow a teacher to determine how well the material has been learned and whether there is a need for additional instruction. The most effective teachers also ask students to explain the process they used to answer the question, to explain how the answer was found. Less successful teachers ask fewer questions and almost no process questions.
(Rosenshine, 2012)
Questions for discussion:
- How often do you use questioning in your lessons?
- What kind of questions do you use?
- When you ask questions, do you know what answers you are trying to get from pupils?- Do you usually get the answers you expect?
High-quality classroom talk and questioning (15 minutes)
Guidance to mentors:
Both the ECT and mentor should have read the ‘Learning about questioning and high-quality classroom talk’ section of the self-directed study materials ahead of the topic.
In this part of the mentor topic, the mentor will be asking questions to check the ECT’s understanding of what they have read. The guidance below provides a full range of responses which show understanding. However, do not treat this as a ‘test’ of the ECT’s knowledge; use the prompts to elicit fuller answers or clarify if they have misunderstood any aspect.
Suggested dialogue for mentors:
You completed activity 5.3 of the self-directed study materials ‘Learning about questioning and high-quality classroom talk’. Let’s discuss your response to the questions to check your understanding.
- What is the difference between closed and open questions?
- A closed question is a question with a Yes/No or single item answer. These are quick to ask and answer, good for checking factual understanding.
- An open question typically elicits longer responses where pupils need to reflect and use more complex reasoning.
- How can questioning be used to check pupils’ prior knowledge
- Ask questions which directly draw on prior knowledge.
- It can expose misconceptions.
- Pupils can be encouraged to articulate their understanding of key ideas, summarising and reformulating them in order to reinforce their knowledge.
- How can questioning be used to assess pupils’ understanding?
- To check where pupils don’t understand.
- To break problematic concepts down further.
- To encourage pupils to think hard – a key factor in learning.
- Pupils can be encouraged to articulate their understanding of key ideas, summarising and reformulating them in order to reinforce their knowledge.
- What constitutes high-quality classroom talk?
- Talk which supports pupils to articulate key ideas.
- Helps pupils consolidate understanding.
- Helps pupils to extend their vocabulary.
- According to Alexander, high-quality classroom talk is collective, reciprocal, supportive, cumulative and purposeful.
- How can it be used effectively?
- Teacher and pupils engage in dialogue as opposed to the teacher doing all of the talking.
- The teacher must set up the expectations and encourage pupils to engage in active dialogue rather than passive listening.
- Pupils taught how to listen, react and respond.
- All contributions should be valued and respected.
- The teacher might introduce group discussion guidelines for pupils to adhere to.
- In contrast to closed questions, open questions allow ideas to be explored and built upon.
- The teacher might help link previous learning and ideas to deepen understanding.
- Clear goal established.
- The talk should be well planned, including protocols such as how to contribute, length of time for the discussion and what happens next.
- The teacher plays an important role to skilfully manage classroom talk and keep it focused on the purpose intended – this might include giving sentence stems or facilitating the discussion.
Extend and challenge pupils using a range of questions (20 minutes)
We can use questions to extend and challenge pupils’ thinking and understanding.
Read the examples of the different ways the teacher responds to the pupil’s response with follow-on questions:
Example A:
Teacher: Khadejah, look at the picture and tell me one adaptation that a camel has.
Khadejah: A camel lives in the desert.
Teacher: Safia, what do I mean by adaptation?
Safia: An adaptation is how animals have changed to survive in their habitat.
Teacher: Khadejah, can you use Safia’s definition of adaptation to see something in the picture which helps a camel to live in the desert?
Example B:
Teacher: Khadejah, look at the picture and tell me one adaptation that a camel has.
Khadejah: A camel has brown hair.
Teacher: Safia, can you explain whether you agree with Khadejah’s answer?
Example C:
Teacher: Khadejah, look at the picture and tell me one adaptation that a camel has.
Khadejah: A camel has humps.
Teacher: How confident are you in that answer?
Khadejah: 2 out of 5.
Teacher: What question could you ask Safia to help you feel more confident?
Khadejah: Safia, what is an adaptation?
Questions for discussion:
- How does the teacher respond to the pupil’s response?
- What sort of questions does the teacher ask?
- How do the follow-on questions support pupil understanding?
- What does it reveal to the teacher?
- Why might it be useful to plan out the questions to ask before the lesson?
Ask the ECT to think about an upcoming lesson. Together with the mentor, plan out all the things the pupil will need to know in this lesson. There is an example below to help:
Example:
Adaptation – pupils will need to know:
- That adaptation is when living things adapt to their habitat
- That it means they have special features that help them survive
- The different ways a camel has adapted to their environment.
Once we have established what pupils will need to know, we can plan out questions to ask pupils to check their understanding and extend and challenge their thinking. Look at the following questions:
- Name an animal and tell me one feature that helps them survive in their habitat?
- How does this feature help them survive?
- In a desert environment, name an animal who is most likely to survive and explain why.
- Would a camel survive in the same environment as a polar bear?
- What implications would there be if a camel did not have its hump?
Follow-on questions:
- Can you explain that further?
- What do you mean?
- What would the next step be?
- Can you explain your reasoning?
Questions for discussion:
- What do you notice about the questions?
- A: They become increasingly difficult.
- Why plan questions that become increasingly difficult?
- A: To scaffold pupils towards being able to answer more complex questions and to support them to develop a level of sophistication.
- What is the importance of follow-on questions?
- A: To ensure that pupils have developed their responses and so that you know that their answer comes from sound understanding.
Together, use the list of what pupils need to know to write questions that build on the level of challenge. Think about:
- What will pupils need to know?
- Are there facts that require closed questions?
- How will you probe understanding?
- If pupils answer correctly, what further question can you ask to stretch pupils?
Pose the question: what if pupils do not know the answer? What will you do?
One way we can respond is through reframing the question to provide greater scaffold:
Example C:
Teacher: Khadejah, look at the picture and tell me one adaptation that a camel has.
Khadejah: Ummm, I am not sure.
Teacher: Tell me one thing you notice about the camel?
Khadejah: It has a hump.
Teacher: Ok, so what can you remember about the camel’s hump?
Khadejah: It stores water.
Together, reframe one question to scaffold the pupil’s answer if they get it wrong the first time.
Wait time (15 minutes)
Read the following together with your ECT:
Many teachers do not plan and conduct classroom dialogue in ways that might help students to learn. Research has shown that, after asking a question, many teachers wait less than one second and then, if no answer is forthcoming, ask another question or answer the question themselves. A consequence of such short “wait time” is that the only questions that “work” are those that can be answered quickly, without thought — that is, questions calling for memorized facts. Consequently, the dialogue is at a superficial level. As one teacher put it:
‘I’d become dissatisfied with the closed Q & A style that my unthinking teaching had fallen into, and I would frequently be lazy in my acceptance of right answers and sometimes even tacit complicity with a class to make sure none of us had to work too hard… They and I knew that if the Q & A wasn’t going smoothly, I’d change the question, answer it myself, or only seek answers from the “brighter students.” There must have been times (still are?) where an outside observer would see my lessons as a small discussion group surrounded by many sleepy onlookers.’ — James, Two Bishops School
Black and Wiliam (2004)
Questions for discussion:
- How long do you wait for pupils to answer questions?
- How many pupils typically answer questions in one lesson?
- How often do you quickly move on or answer the question yourself?
- Do you always hold out for an answer that is 100% correct?
Have a look at the non-example of effective questioning:
Example:
Teacher: How does the writer use the weather to set the tone at the beginning of the novel?Pupil: It’s bad weather?Teacher: That’s right, the writer uses pathetic fallacy in showing us that it is a storm at the beginning of the novel.
Pose the question: why is this a non-example?
- Does not offer wait time.
- Sets a low standard of correctness
- Teacher effectively ‘rounds up’ the pupil response
- Teacher repeats the pupil answer and adds detail
- We do not know whether the pupil knew this information.
Have a look at how the teacher could respond differently:
Example:
Teacher: How does the writer use the weather to set the tone at the beginning of the novel?Pupil: It’s bad weather?PAUSEPupil: Ummm, I guess it is stormy weather so maybe events will be up and down?Teacher: Can you phrase that differently?Pupil: The writer opens with a storm to show the reader that the mood is unsettled.Teacher: Which is an example of which technique?Pupil: Pathetic fallacy and foreshadowing.Teacher: That’s right….
Pose the question: what is the difference?
Discussion might cover:
- The teacher uses wait time
- Teacher holds out for 100%
- Offers prompts but does not give the answer
- Asks the pupil to use technical vocabulary
Ask the ECT to look back at their example questions from the last activity, select one and practise asking it to the mentor who will be playing the role of a pupil who is slow to respond.
You should have two rounds of practice:
- After being given wait time the pupil volunteers an answer.
- After the wait time the pupil still doesn’t know the answer so the ECT needs to ask a follow up question.
Planning for action
The ECT should write down two things they will do as a result of this topic.
In the next topic, the ECT will share their reflections from observations of colleagues which they can complete during the time allocated in self-study materials Activity 5.5. If they have not yet planned these observations, discuss who they should observe and why.