By now, you probably have had at least a few solo sessions, both in-person and online. It's important to start practicing asking open-ended questions. Asking guiding, open-ended questions is a significant part of the QSC's tutoring philosophy.
Closed questions typically require a short or single-word answer, like "yes", "no", or a specific fact. They can be useful can be useful for checking a student's understanding of the concepts you are reviewing. However, they are quite limited in their ability to guide students' thinking.
Open-ended questions require more thought and elaboration by encouraging students to explain their thinking. They are useful for exploring a student's reasoning, building deeper understanding, and promoting critical thinking.
The majority of the questions you ask the students in sessions should be open-ended.
Here are some examples:
What do you need help with?
How did you get that?
What was your thought process?
Can you explain that?
Show me the steps
Open-ended questions should ALWAYS be used at the beginning of the session, as well as when a new question or section is started. As you get further into the problem, you may need to start using more pointed questions, giving more guiding questions, or even run a short example as you are able to more accurately evaluate the student’s level of understanding.
Quarter 1 - Week 8 - Check in with your mentor 1
Pt 1: Continuously asking open-ended questions can be difficult. Ask your mentor what they do when they have difficulty coming up with questions for the student.
Pt 2: Observe an experienced tutor for a full 30 min session. You've done a few of these already, but this time, really focus on the questions they ask. Count the number of yes/no questions vs the number of open-ended questions. Again, think about what you learned and what you want to try in your sessions.