We know that questions are the most often used strategy applied by teachers after lecturing and since we have clear that standing in front of a class and do all the talking is the deadliest sin a teacher can commit, let’s eliminate that item from the list.
Now, after lecturing is gone, the first place is for questions. But….any kind of questions? The ones in the textbook? The ones that I am going to include in the next test? No….Essential questions.
What are “essential” questions?
This chapter tells us about this kind of questions and how they can make a difference when teaching. We can transform our class from a dull, non-sense asking and answering machine into an instance of thinking, analyzing , transferring information from previous experiences into the class, so as to make it as close as possible to the “real context” we are always looking for so badly.
Essential questions are the ones that make the minds of our students work, the ones that trigger all the potential inside their brains.
When I read a text like this , my deepest concern is to relate what I am reading with theories I know or have heard about ( I am transferring…GOOD!), and in this opportunity Bloom’s taxonomy and Krashen’s i+1 hypotheses came to my mind.
“Essential questions do not refer to the topic content but to the big ideas that cut across units and courses.”
It is not the same to ask our students what colors are there in the picture? than what do you think colors in the picture mean?. The first one can be answered mechanically, whereas the second requires deep, critical thought, the student is invoking all the ideas in his mind, to give an answer. What a difference right? BUT:
What happens if my student is engaged, he is transferring information from that day when he went to a place with his mother to see what color her soul was and the woman said purple and purple meant sadness and so on and so forth…BUT he can hardly manage basic vocabulary, he will not be able to answer my question in spite of having the answer. I have faced this situation and I can see frustration in that student’s face.
Was it my fault to ask a question unanswerable with the tools that students have?
I know I have to provide my students with input that goes just one step beyond their level of command of the language. (Here is the part where Krashen was haunting me)
My question is…how can I harmonize the level of my students with deep, thought provoking questions?
Regarding Bloom’s taxonomy:
Essential questions require students to evaluate, synthesize and analyze therefore, essential questions can be found at the top of Bloom’s taxonomy.
That made me think about the teachers that came before me in my student’s lives.
If they were never taught to go beyond the simplest level of mind work which is knowledge, they will not be able to answer the essential questions.
Our Chilean culture is shy, always afraid of giving opinions; therefore the challenge is not only to elicit language from my students but also to leave aside that shy side of them.
All I can say is that the text states it very wisely: Asking essential questions is an art and it is a must when developing critical thinking in our students, overcoming language levels and cultural features. How? That is our challenge.
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ReplyDeleteYes Vicky, you are certainly right. In order to start thinking about real fundamental questions, the first step is of course not to keep on commiting the same sin we are so used to commit, i.e. giving a step ahead of our ‘day after day teacher-centered talk’ and explore a vast range of possibilities which foster transferability is extremely necessary. One of the possibilities is generating tought-provoking questions, as the authors propose, since these could really make ta difference when teaching our learners.
ReplyDeleteA good way we can harmonize the level of our students with deep, thought- provoking questions, as you say, is indeed a fundamental question , for Wiggins and Mc Tighe claim to establish a balance between overarching and topical questions.
No doubt one of our challenges is of course developing critical thinking, but affective aspects, which are usually neglected, do have a bearing on how tackling the notion of appealing to our students’ attention by devicing coherent, pertinent and effective questions.
I absolutely agree on the idea of not considering our classrooms and our students as machines, but human beings.However, the idyosincratic issues - or sociocultural in nature, you have reffered to are unsurprisingly a big topic for further debate.
Uf, What a question! You pointed out the same point as Lorena did. What about those students who cannot use English to answer essential questions. As we are teachers of English we are always looking for the answers in English. However, as this step is a huge one, we have to go little by little. What I mean by this is, in my personal opinion that we have to encourage the content of the answer and not the form of it. If the students are not able to answer an essential question in their mother tongue, imagine them trying to do it in a foreign language….it should be a mess. Therefore, once we have realized the students have developed or are still developing critical thinking, and then our students will be able to use the same pattern to answer essential questions in English, but little by little. It is true that sometimes we ask questions and our students ask “how do you say this or that…?” Or simply “I don’t know how to say it in English”. Well, as a teacher I can offer step by step training and time. The issue is that our students “think”.
ReplyDelete"It is not the same to ask our students what colors are there in the picture? than what do you think colors in the picture mean?."
ReplyDeleteI think it's clear enough, I totally agree with you when you mention that we "teachers" must take our students beyond. It's not enough to see what they have in front of their eyes, but the meaning it makes for each one of them, according to their beliefs, cultural background and previous experiences. But then, in order to make good interpretations and conclusions they need to have a very strong basis, the previous knowlegde that will allow them to compare, analyze and finally understand the picture.
God, it's a hard work that needs to be helped by every teacher since the most elementary levels at school.
VICKY,
ReplyDeleteI try to be self-critical about the approach and strategies I use in the classroom. Many tmes I have come to the conclusion that I am not transferring learning in a cross-curricular way. Nevertheless, there will be always a next leeson to fix what you spoiled in the previous one. The presure from schools to cover content and sacrifice true understanding is so overwhelming that we prefer to prioritize factual information.
Concerning the idea of students asking essential questions, I agree with Angelina that we should favour content rather than form. Gradually students could be encoraged to give more satisfactory and accurate responses as far as English is concerened.
Borrowing the idea of students not giving any sign of life in classes, specially those of upper grades.. I believe we really need time to think in questions able to remove their brain cells and provoke some kind of reaction, any.But in doing this, we have to take into account some points that are not mentioned in the book, or maybe they are and I did not see them.Aniway, we have to leave a certain amount of time to leave them think and answer and accept different kinds of answers not just the correct ones, I think.
ReplyDeletethx