Questions - Ch. 13

Do you know a person who likes to ask questions? Someone who seems to pause and wonder at almost anything that you say or do? I know someone like that. They ask question after question and by the time you’re done you feel like you learned something about yourself, not just them. Answering questions in this way brings greater understanding and clarity in given situations.

Have you ever had a different opinion than someone and use questions to guide them to your own opinion? I have. By just asking questions, I seem innocent and curious when really, I lead them right to the conclusion that I want them to. In a way, I teach by asking questions.

Questions are powerful and are keys to learning in any situation. Brown in Lee in their textbook “Teaching by Principles” explain how teachers should adopt a question strategy. Questions benefit students in multiple ways. For one, it creates interaction. Interaction draws out a practical side of language that encourages students to use what they know in order to communicate. By asking questions, students engage with one another and/or the teacher. They can also respond in authentic ways when a teacher presents them with a question (see http://thetesladventure.blogspot.com/2018/10/the-heart-of-communication.html for more about what I have to say about interaction).

Another benefit of students using questions in an ESL classroom is the very basic reason why questions are helpful, you receive answers. When a student is able to communicate questions, teachers are able to bring clarity to that which is misunderstood or not clear.

Teachers also use questions in order to teach their students. Brown and Lee refer to two type of questions teachers use, display questions and referential questions. Display questions refer to questions that the teacher already knows the answer to. Referential questions refer to questions that the teacher does not yet know the answer to.

Display questions can be helpful, especially in beginning levels of learning English. It can be useful for teaching basic vocabulary and gives students an opportunity to be taught appropriate sentence structure by the teacher. A teacher could hold up a shoe and ask “what is this?” The class should all respond the same, “shoe!” After collecting homework, a teacher could ask students “did you do your homework?” Students answers may vary but the teacher would know the correct response, answers could be “yes” or “no” or “yes, I did my homework” or “no, I forgot.” Display questions although useful at times can often become tedious and patronizing for a class. They should be used within reason.

Referential questions are a lot more fun to use as there is a lot more authenticity involved. Questions such as the 5 W’s become more common as well as asking how something works, asking what the summary or conclusion of a text is, and many more. These types of questions are often more open-ended and could have varying responses depending on the person. Referential questions are the most common questions and ones that help students learn, clarify, explore, expand and create.

Questions are a very important part of learning and should be encouraged at every point in our lives, especially in the classroom. By asking and responding to questions, we can expand our knowledge, glean wisdom from those around us, and contribute our own thoughts to willing ears.

Bibliography

Brown, H. D., & Lee, H. (2015). Teaching by principles: An interactive approach to language pedagogy (Fourth ed.). White Plains, NY: Pearson Education.

For more resources look these up:

Beare, K. (2018, March 3). Learn How to Ask Questions in English Class to Help You Learn. Retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/asking-questions-in-class-4093551
Display questions. (2008, April). Retrieved from https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/display-questions