I have found it beneficial to ask general questions that students could answer in many ways, as it allows you to lead them in the right direction by correcting or clarifying. The student may not answer right away, so its important to give them time to think it through and to help them work through it without directly giving an answer.
- Sasha Arne
As a mentor, it is not your job to have an answer to every question. Just because you’re mentoring a certain class does not mean that you need to know the criteria by heart. A good way to navigate being a mentor and answering questions is not to give them the answer every time, but to ask supporting and engaging questions to help them find the answers on their own. For example, you could say “What is the first step we should take? What resources do you already have that you can use?” Sometimes it can be helpful to hint at things that they learned in class that may help them find their answer.
- Cassie Jantzen
Although it may be easy to just go the easy way and give the student the answer - especially if you understand the work they are doing - you can't just do it for them. They won't always have you, so you need to really push them to do it themselves. One way is to ask a lot of questions, but you can’t just ask yes or no questions. You have to ask questions such as, “What do you already know about this problem? What do you see? Does this look familiar to anything you’ve already done? Do the directions sound familiar?” And even if the answers they give you aren’t right, it’ll give you a really good basis for what you are able to help them with right now. In the future, questions are also a great way to get them started when you haven’t met with them for a while.
-Julia Knudson
The most important thing to know as a mentor, and as a teacher, is that teaching is always easier one-on-one. There will be times where you work with the class as a whole, but try to make time to work with kids either one-on-one or in a small group. It can be more personal, and easier for you and them. When working with the whole class, there is no way to know what everyone is thinking, and inevitably, there will be some people who are confused. But one-on-one, you an answer those questions, and help those students who might not understand otherwise.
- Will Maas
I always like to start off by having the students describe to me what they do already know. Because not only will this give me the time to figure out what the student needs help on, but this technique also helps students work to develop a solution on their own accord. After that, I often like to use pictures, drawings, or different activities to visualize the information so that the students have something physical to base their learning off of. I've found that using this method leads to students understanding the concepts at a higher level and also opens the door for more questions that they might have.
- Aadi Gawade
Not just asking questions to lead them to an answer but asking questions to get a handle on their level of comprehension is very helpful. For instance, after a student comes up with an answer, regardless of if it is correct or not, you can say, "What led you to that answer? Why do you feel that's correct?" Just make sure to tell them that you asking that isn't necessarily implying they're wrong, you just want to make sure they understand how they got there. Additionally, after explaining a concept, ask the student, "Does that make sense? Do you need me to explain it another way or in more detail?" to make sure they aren't just going along with what you're saying and they actually understand the material.
-Mar McGrath
Something that surprised me was how much the students actually knew themselves. A lot of kids liked me to be there as a safety net, so I could catch mistakes while they happen. It is important to realize that these students likely know far more than you realize. Do not be afraid to to answer all of their questions with other questions. It is really amazing to watch them work through something that they thought they couldn't, just with their prior knowledge. Your job is to help them tap in to that prior knowledge by asking questions that prompt higher level thinking. Some of my favorite questions were "Where have you seen this type of problem before?" or "What do we know about this type of equation?". Questions like this really made students think about what they were doing and why they were doing it.
-Annika Lavender
To guide students towards a solution you have to do it in a way where they are learning how to solve something step by step on their own. Most of the time when a student doesn’t know how to solve a problem it’s not that they don’t know, but it’s that they don’t trust themselves to do it by themselves because they think they will fail. To guide students towards a solution, you should ask them questions that would be beneficial for them to use for future challenges as well. Don't always ask them yes or no questions because those don’t leave the door open for them to challenge themselves. You should ask questions that allow them to figure out what resources to use to solve it, and how they can do this on their own for potentially any problem in their lives. Questions such as: what resources do you have to help with this (notes, equations, books, rubric)?; do you have any examples similar to this problem?; what are you trying to find? etc. These questions not only help the student solve the problem, but they teach the student that they are capable of solving something by themselves and that they have the resources available to help them.
- Georgia Klotz
When you ask students questions to guide them, use words that the teacher used in lecture or in the worksheets. When you structure sentences this way, students tend to remember or recall where they learned. This is beneficial because it helps students reconnect with the moment they learned something and for them to use that for the current question or situation. There will also be times when you yourself do not know exactly how to navigate a problem. When this occurs, you can start with steps: break down the problem or question, identify the pieces you need, figure out the order you need them in, and build the solution using those pieces.
- Ricky Moncayo
My advice is to always start with "What do you know?" This question was key to me because it allowed me to gauge what the student needed to work on. Often, the student may answer nothing and I see this as a chance to show them they know more than they think. From there, I have them try to work through the problem. My next tip is if they really seem lost, demo the problem. Choose a problem similar and show them how you would do it. This solidifies the process in their head and soon they know how they should go about thinking about the problems.
-A
Start out asking what the assignment is or what they need to do, even if you already know. Ask clarifying questions, such as "What's the next step?" or "What do you need to do next?". When explaining a concept, remember to ask students if they understand what you have worked on or if they have further questions.
- Nina Brown
I would start out by asking questions that help you figure out their level of knowledge with the assignment. This way you can figure out more specific questions that could help the student. When it comes to worksheets that involve math, it can get confusing fast, but by asking questions around the answer and asking about how the student got there can help you figure out what might've been the mistake or what method the student didn't implement correctly. My best strategy with questioning students was asking them to explain the assignment to me and if they got to a part they didn't quite understand, that would be my cue to hop in and start asking more specific questions.
-Rohan Sajeev