Bethany Wilson

Dr. McClary
EDUC 423
Field Experience 2015
Effective Questioning
Questioning is one of the most important dimensions of teaching and learning. The types
of questioning my mentor teacher used in the classroom were effective. My first couple of visits
to the school, I noticed that every morning before the start of class, my teacher started off the day
with a couple of questions which she referred to as a Do Now. These questions were based on
things that were learned the day before. I felt this was a good questioning method because it got
the students recalling information that they had learning the day before and it got them thinking.
After doing this, Miss Elliott then taught a new concept or idea related to the Do Now
questions that they were given. This form of questioning would be formative. Miss Elliott,
wanted to test the knowledge of the students by assessing them on information they were
learning throughout the unit. When it came time to discuss the questions, the teacher randomly
called out students to read their answers. There was then a classroom discussion based on the
answers given. This questioning method is a great way to get students thinking and getting their
creative juices flowing in the morning.
During the days as I observed Miss Elliot more, I noticed her questioning method was
interesting yet very effective. Most of the questions she asked were open-ended. She always
allowed the students to think before she would call on someone to answer. An example of one of
the questions she asked during her instruction was, How do you know this is right?. This part
of the lesson was asking student about whether or not the hypothesis that the students came up

with was correct or incorrect. She gave the students opportunity to share their hypotheses and
they were to tell whether what they predicted was true or false and why. Before any of the
students could raise their hands, Miss Elliot made clear to the students what she wanted and to
briefly explains their ideas. Asking students questions and giving them time to organize their
thoughts is important. Increased wait-time is related to a number of student outcomes, including
improved achievement and retention, greater numbers of higher cognitive responses, longer
responses, decreases in interruptions, and increased student-student interactions. These outcomes
are quite similar to those observed with an increased frequency of higher cognitive questions. In
fact, researchers believe that a causal relationship may exist between the two: higher cognitive
questions require more wait-time, and more wait-time allows for the implementation of higher
cognitive discussions. She also used the probing question method. Instead of just asking student
what they predicted, she asked why their solution came to be true or false.
I also took note of how she used questions to refer back to instruction. Questions like,
What term did we just learn that relates to this? help student refer back to prior knowledge.
Questioning techniques are a heavily used, and thus widely researched, teaching strategy.