1. Asking the right questions to stimulate students’ minds.

2.  The purpose of this training is to provide participating teachers with the knowledge, skills, and resources needed to effectively use questioning techniques to improve instruction in the classroom.

3.  In today’s training session you will:  Understand types of questions and their uses in both reading and math.  Discover ways to both ask questions and give feedback in a way to maximize learning potential in many classroom situations.  Design a plan to incorporate and improve questioning within the overall afterschool session.

4.  Read the passage given to you. Create 5 questions to accurately assess your typical afterschool student’s mastery of the passage.

5.  Right There: These refer to questions that are explicitly identified in the text.  Think and Search: The answers to these questions are in the text, but are composed of multiple parts spread out over multiple areas.  Author and Me: These answers are not explicit in the text. Readers must combine what they know already with the author’s message to create an answer.  On My Own: These answers are not in the text, and may not require the text to be answered. Readers must use their own knowledge and experiences to answer these questions (Raphael, 1986).

6.  Categorize the group’s questions.  Most questions made up on the spot fall into the category of “Right There.”  A few may fall into “Think and Search.”  Little to no “Author and Me” or “On My Own.”

7.  In order to have a balance of question types, questions must be prepared ahead of time.  How often do we check for understanding with our students by asking “Right There” questions?  Is this always a bad thing?  

8.  Turn to a partner and discuss situations where each type of question would be appropriate in an afterschool reading lesson.  Share your partner’s thoughts with another pair of individuals. 

9.  Right There: Help determine if a student is paying attention and understanding what he or she is reading.  Think and Search: Help determine if a student has a holistic understanding of the text he or she is reading.  Author and Me: Help determine whether a student is able to interpret the larger implied messages in a text.  On My Own: Help determine whether a student is able to apply messages from the text to his or her own prior knowledge and experiences.

10.  Activity 2: Imagine that you are teaching a group of students two-digit subtraction with regrouping. Create 3 questions that you might ask students during some part of the learning process.

11.  If you’re like most teachers, the biggest majority of the questions would center around students being able to calculate the correct answer.  These are certainly important questions that should be asked.  But there are many more types of questions that relate to math concepts and processes.

12.  What do the numbers in the problem represent?  How is _____ related to ____?  What evidence supports your conclusion?  Can you create a model of this problem OR can you create an equation from this modeled problem?  What patterns did you notice in…?

13.  Make sense of problems.  Use abstract and quantitative reasoning.  Use evidence and reasoning to critique the reasoning of others.  Use models.  Use tools.  Be precise.  Make use of structure.  Look for regularity in repeated reasoning (Everette, 2013).

14.  Probing questions refer to having students explain, reword, defend, and critique their thoughts about a particular topic.  It stimulates the nerve cells of the brain to grow new connections and improve existing ones.  Helps improve the feedback process by generating some level of self-feedback.  Has to be planned ahead and done deliberately.

15.  Probe both right and wrong answers. Students will quickly pick up on a teacher who only probes incorrect answers.  Don’t try to probe everything. Time is always a factor. Planning ahead will help you determine which questions and topics you are going to probe and how you will probe them.  Don’t wait too long for feedback. Probing delays feedback, which is worth it up to a point. Keep in mind the age and level of the students when deciding how far to take a particular probing session.

16.  No pun intended!  “Are there any questions?” is the least effective way to question small children.

17.  Proper questioning can improve achievement in reading and math.  There are no bad questions; it’s a matter of using questions appropriately for given situations.  Effective questioning must be deliberate and planned in advance.  Probing can help to reinforce and expand a student’s learning about a particular topic if done correctly.

18. Everette, M. (2013). A guide to the 8 mathematical practice standards. Retrieved from http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/top- teaching/2013/03/guide-8-mathematical- practice-standards. http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/top- Raphael, T. (1986). Teaching question answer relationships, revisited. The ReadingTeacher (39) 6, 516-522