Questioning

Add your own suggestions here -https://docs.google.com/document/d/13GLFaqbqcGK_2ZmBLBKvGGTFf4iFdaftxAmxJuHHV-Y/edit?usp=sharing 

Think, Puzzle, Explore - used to starting a discussion on a new topic. What did you think you already knew? What do you not understand about this topic? What are you hoping to explore?

Pyramid Questioning - start your questioning with your most confident learners and work your way down the class to your least confident before working your way back up. What have learners picked up?

Brown, Silver, Gold - Increasing the difficulties of questioning e.g. identify, describe and explain

Difficult Questions at the Start - posing a difficult question at the start of the lesson but not coming back to it until the end. This gives pupils thinking time and builds intrigue.

Lifelines - support learners to feel comfortable during questioning by providing 'lifelines'. Pupils can draw lifeline symbols on show-me boards/their desks and then cross these out as they use them. Suggestions include '50:50' (teacher gives a hint), 'phone a friend' (ask a peer for help) and 'ask the audience' (where the whole class give hints by drawing/writing on their show-me boards).

Pose, Pause, Pounce, Bounce (taken from 'Power up Your Pedagogy' by Bruce Robertson) - ask a question (pose), allow thinking time (pause), ask someone to answer (pounce) and ask another student to comment on the answer (bounce) and keep going. This technique encourages all pupils to listen and also gives pupils thinking time.

What could it be? - Questions such as ‘what do you think it COULD be’ or ‘what do you think the answer MIGHT be to...’ are incredibly powerful in encouraging more students to put up their hands.

Just One More Question - Encourage your students to work collaboratively in groups to create an array of quality questions then give them a series of challenging question stems to broaden their range of questions. Stems include: ‘What if...?’, ‘Suppose we knew...?’ and ‘What would change if...?’

Wait Time  - It is estimated that learners on average only have 0.9 seconds of thinking time between the teacher asking a question and having to respond. Try increasing wait time by three seconds to allow learners to process the question and begin to order their thinking. Increasing thinking time can improve the quality and depth of responses.

Cold Call Questioning - inform pupils that they could be called to answer a question at any time. This includes strategies like lollipop sticks, random name generators and 'no hands up'.

Question-focused Feedforward - ask pupils questions to get them thinking about how they can improve their work in the future (as opposed to telling them what they have done wrong).

Surprise Questioning - could be done at the start, middle or end of a lesson. Set pupils a 'pop quiz' with 5-10 short response questions related to your subject. This is an example of 'low stakes' assessment and allows for effective retrieval practice. 

Answers First - give pupils the answers to questions rather than the question itself. Pupils need to then come up with the question - including any command words and marks allocated.

Mentimeter