What are the best question types for students? How do you decide what questions to use in your lessons? What questioning can you use to enhance your student’s learning?
As you know, what one student understands doesn’t always transfer over to all your students. You are working with a variety of students with a number of skill levels.
That is why it important to offer your students a range of types of questions. Using a butterfly unit theme, hopefully, all your questions and the ones above will be answered with the following six best question types for students
1. Probing Questions
A series of questions which require students to go beyond the first response. Subsequent teacher questions are formed on the basis of the student’s responses.
Five Kinds of Probing Questions
- Clarify: What do you mean by the term metamorphosis?
- Increase Critical Thinking: What are reasons for thinking butterflies can do this?
- Refocusing: How does your answer relate to the butterfly’s life cycle?
- Prompting: What is the first stage of a butterfly’s life?
- Redirecting: How do butterflies eat? Student: They use their proboscis. Different Student: Do you agree?
2. Factual Questions
Factual questions require the student to recall specific information learned. Often, they use who, what, when, where, etc.
Two Kinds of Factual Questions
- Simple Bits of Information: How many legs does a butterfly have?
- Sequence of Events: What are the stages of a butterfly’s life cycle?
3. Divergent Questions
Questions with no right or wrong answers, but which encourage exploration of possibilities. Requires both concrete and abstract thinking to arrive at an appropriate response.
Divergent Question Examples
- What could happen if the caterpillar did not eat enough food?
- After reading a butterfly story ask: How would the story have been different if…?
4. Higher Order Questions
Student questions that require the student to figure out answers rather than just remember them. They require generalizations related to facts in a meaningful pattern.
Five Kinds of Higher Order Questions
- Evaluation: Which of these two butterfly books are nonfiction book?
- Inference: In are studies of butterflies what can you conclude about what happens in a chrysalis?
- Comparison: How are caterpillars and butterflies the same?
- Applications: Knowing what you know about a butterfly’s life cycle, what do you think a ladybugs life cycle may be?
- Problem Solving: Suppose there was not any milkweed for the Monarch butterfly to lay their eggs on, what do you think could happen to the Monarch butterfly? What do you think you could do to solve this problem?
5. Affective Questions
Affective questioning elicits expressions of attitude, values or feelings.
Affective Question Examples
- Would you like to be a butterfly? If so, why?
- After reading a butterfly story: How do you feel about the story?
6. Structuring Questions
Types of questions related to the setting in which learning is occurring.
Structuring Question Examples
- After a lesson or directions for an assignment ask: Are there any questions? Any other comments? Is the assignment clear?
In summary, there are six best question types for students that can be used to develop a variety of questions to help students think. Using a variety of these questioning strategies in your lesson are important so students can become critical thinkers and questioners themselves!
Grab your Free, Butterfly Questions Worksheet Here!
Find some more reading activities and assessments in my store, The Teaching Scene by Maureen.
To read more topics check out my blog, “Seven Effective First Grade Assessment Tools”
