how might effective questioning encourage high achievement in an interactive class?
Introduction
Teaching and learning process is one of the components of the Indonesian national standards of education for primary and secondary schools (Indonesian Government Regulation No 19, 2005). This component will always be strategic in relation to school improvement. Built in to this strategy is a requirement to make sure that teaching is effectively delivered.
Furthermore, improving students’ competence is the objective of teaching, and this is being used as an indicator of success in implementing the teacher’s model of teaching and learning. Thus, it is necessary to manage the process of implementation of the model and its results. The facility or tool to do it will not always be expensive.Questioning is a very cheap tool for teaching and has a high potential to trigger students’ success in learning. One of the teaching goals is to develop students’ potential to think. A teacher’s questioning may lead students to think. Thus, in an interactive class, one way of delivering successful learning is to manage the process of questioning within the classroom. This kind of questioning can be briefly described as a questioning which triggers students’ thinking to respond. A detailed explanation will be included in the next subtopic.In the Indonesian context, discussions (in seminar, workshop, etc) about effective questioning do not often take place, although, it is common for teachers to ask good questions of their students. In an interactive classroom, questioning, receiving answers and discussing those answers is a priority. While preparing for teaching or engaging in observation before teaching, relatively few teachers study and identify questions which will be beneficial for themselves and their students.
It was assumed that contextual comment would emerge from analyses or discussions on effective questioning and this would be beneficial and supportive for teachers in encouraging a class to think. It is hoped that conclusions drawn from this descriptive study on effective questioning would in time be adopted by Indonesian teachers to improve the teaching and learning process. Moreover, as a supplement to this process, there would be a need for school governing bodies to devise a training course on effective questioning.
It has been suggested that effective questioning is a precondition of successful learning because it focuses on the optimal potential of the class. In other words, students’ responses are the real attainment indicator of learning in a class. Between the start and end of his/her lesson, the teacher needs to pay attention to students’ responses. To find out students’ progress within an interactive class, the teacher has to engage in a process of questioning, and only then can learning targets be achieved. Question and answer, discussion, and interview are aimed to help students understand the content of the lesson. Responses to the teacher’s questions reflect students’ understanding; the extent to which is determined by the effectiveness of the questions and the techniques involved in asking them. Thus, teachers have to manage their questions in order to reflect their own standards of competence in their specialist subjects.
I carried out a research on effective questioning and proved that asking appropriate questions supported by an effective technique in addressing these questions improves and develops the class. Improvement and development can be shown by a greater level of interactive responses and success in formative tests.
Defining effective questioning
In general, asking effective questions in an interactive classroom is a means or a strategy for a teacher to achieve better learning. Questioning in this context is considered to be an activity which bridges the gap between two parties: the questioning person who wants to know something and the answering, responding person who provides the answer. In this way, questioning functions not only to provide someone with the opportunity to communicate but also to differentiate the status between them – that is – questioner and questionee.
Through effective questioning, the two parties are connected and interconnected clearly and tightly. This situation encourages a class to be eager to develop and improve. So effective questioning is not only concerned with the content of the questions but also the techniques to present questions effectively. Effective questions contain words which mean asking students to make connections with what they are discussing. Effective techniques refers to the way to help students understand the problem and to have an opportunity to answer fluently. These techniques also enable the teacher to collect information about students’ competences, because their answers will probably reflect their understanding of the problem.
The effective question will always be an interesting topic to research. Some factors encourage it. Effective questioning can probably be considered as a gateway to explore one’s knowledge and competence, a means to reflect, a way of maximizing good communication among the various parties, and hence an appropriate topic and tool to research.
If you carry out a research on effective questioning, there are some references which could be tools to analyze your data and synthesize to the best conclusion. They are Bloom’s (1956) taxonomy of educational objectives – cognitive domain; quality questioning by Walsh and Sattes (2005), effective questioning criteria by Wright and Nuttall (2000) and stepped. The data could be categorized into levels of questions based on Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives. Then the data which showed effective interaction between the teacher and her students is analyzed by reference to a set of categories, such as: quality questions (Walsh and Sattes, 2005), purposeful questions (DfES, 2002), powerful questions (Vogt, Et Al 2003), and so on (see below). Elements in the Bloom’s theory as follow:
The Level of Knowledge
In this level, students have to be knowledgeable, or they able to: recall, memorize, name, duplicate, label, review, list, order, recognize, repeat, reproduce, or state.
Levels of Comprehension
We can consider that the words indicating the level: knowledge (define, describe, identify, label, match, name, outline, recognise, reproduce, select, and/or state) are somewhat similar to level of comprehension (convert, defend, distinguish, restate, rephrase, estimate, explain, extend, generalize, infer, give examples, paraphrase, predict, rewrite, summarize) which appear in the students’ answers.
Teacher’s effective technique of questioning also enables a bridge to be built and triggered an appropriate response from the other students. Wright and Nuttall (2000) state that learning improvement is supported by factors, such as: clear questioning and good distribution of questioning to the whole class.
The Level of Application
This is at the level of application. Based on Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives, this application level is not only indicated by certain words at this level, such as: apply, classify, solve, use, show, diagram, demonstrate, record, translate, illustrate, choose, dramatize, employ, operate, practice, schedule, sketch, and write, but also that the meaning of application is cued by the contextual meaning of the application.
The Level of Analysis
The students’ responses describe / indicate that they can analyze, such as: telling the reasons and process the thing happens.
The Level of Synthesis
In this level, students can form a new whole from all parts. This is indicated through some operational words, such as: categorize, combine, compile, compose, create, devise, design, explain, extend, generate, modify, organize, plan, propose, question, rearrange, revise, reconstruct, relate, reorganize, rewrite, restructure, summarize, tell, and write.
The Level of Evaluation
Arguing with something stated will be this kind of evaluation. This evaluation level of questioning not only encourages students to judge something but also to strengthen their arguments. In this case, evaluation was supported by argument.
Asking for evaluation may lead to the emergence of imagination. A conditional sentence can be viewed as an evaluation sentence. The content of this sentence is an imagination. The conditional sentence has triggered the questionee to think imaginatively. The questionees will create an analogy of similarities, differentiations, etc. An interactive class needs to be supported with imagination to keep students thinking.
The Positive Impact of the Investigation
The result of my research concluded that within an interactive class, a teacher has to be creative to manage the questions in order to keep students thinking throughout the lesson. Questioning is particularly useful to explore students’ understanding and comprehension. Questioning can support what kind of relation there will be between the teacher and her students. This is why we can conclude that questioning is powerful. Questioning can lead students to what the teacher wants, and on the contrary, no questioning or minimal questioning will not lead students to effective learning.
The selection of questions is important. This step will have a range of impacts depending upon the level of the questions. Teacher should pay close attention to the level of questions. She has to manage the questions well. The style of managing them will draw out a development of an interactive class. At the very least, step by step questioning from the lowest level to the highest is recommended. This situation should ensure that students make a controllable improvement in their learning.
Written questions presented in the text will not ensure the students’ understanding of the essence of the text, but oral questioning will explore how the process happens, how we can respond, who does it, etc. In addition, questioning will develop the students’ argumentative powers. All of this needs proper techniques for effective questioning.
By analyzing the sequential content of questions, we acknowledge that the teacher can organise her teaching through her questioning style. In this situation, she will come to know the extent of the students’ learning. The teacher’s cue may lead to a long conversation or discussion. At the end of each item of discussion, the teacher should make an informative and comprehensive summary. This will show to the class how improvement and development can be delivered, as Wright and Nuttall (2000, p 12) suggest – ”learning improvement can be indicated by an informative summary.”
Questions at the high levels will exclude the minimal questions in the written test but act still in the area of context. This will really ensure students will be triggered into critical thinking. Using a higher level of questioning will lead to more comprehensive answers. If a student answers a question with an answer which is at a higher level, his answer is more complete and tends to create a new understanding. On the contrary, when a student answers a higher level question with an answer appropriate to a lower level question, his answer will not be complete and will be a low quality answer.
In the first minutes of a class, the teacher should ask the lowest level of question (level knowledge) which is intended to lead to a deeper understanding and recall easier lessons. This will prepare students for more complicated questioning (high levels of questions). Some questions can be a bridge to the higher level of questioning.
An application level of question can be in the middle between lower and higher levels of questions. This level requires the questionees to be able to engage with the context. This is a starting point for the higher and complicated questions. All questions at the levels of analysis, synthesis, and evaluation need the best understanding of context.
Many students answered unsystematically, unclearly and incompletely because students found difficulty and tended to be unable to answer the higher level of questions. In other words, the requirement to answer the higher level of questions is that they have to answer the lower ones correctly. If students find difficulty in answering a question, the teacher has to guide them through the lower levels of questioning so as to stimulate a better answer. The teacher has to consider that the same question may have a different impact when asked in different situations.
According to Socrates, questioning and answering are central to learning. Questions are part of teaching. This is a reminder to all teachers that questioning, although it is powerful, can be useless when it is not managed well. In this situation, Kissock and Lyortsuum (1982, p.1) argue that: “At every stage in education questions are the core around which all communication between teacher and pupils takes place. They are a fundamental tool of teaching and lie at the very heart of developing critical thinking abilities in pupils. Because of their central role, it is important that teachers become familiar with the impact questions have on communication and learning in the classroom, and find ways to improve the use of questions by themselves and their students.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Beck, I.L., et. Al, (1999 – fifth printing) Questioning the Author – An Approach to Enhancing Student Engagement with Text. USA: International Reading Association, Inc.
Bloom, B. S., (ed). (1956) Taxonomy of Educational Objectives: The Classification of Educational Goals, Handbook I: Cognitive Domain (News York: David McKay Company, Inc.
Brown, G., & Wragg, E. C. (1995) Questioning. London & New York: Routledge
Department for Education and Skills (2002) Questioning – Training Materials for the Foundation Subjects – Module 4. http://www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/ secondary/keystage3/downloads/fs_trmat035002m04question.pdf Dillon, J.T. (1988) Questioning and Teaching – A manual of Practice. Great Britain: Billing & Sons Limited.
Education Act Number 20 year 2003 on National Education System.
Government Regulation Number 19 year 2005 on National Education System.
HMI Inspectorate of Education. (2002) Edition. How Good Is Our School (HGIOS) – self-evaluation Using Quality Indicators, Scotland: HMI Inspectorate of Education.
Harris, A., Bennett, N., and Preedy, M. (eds). (1997) Organisational Effectiveness and Improvement in Education. Buckingham: Open University Press.
robertg@ml.petech.ac.za. (1996) Corel Presentations 7. http://www.petech.ac. za/robert/questioning/Default.htm. Corel Corporation, Ltd.
Kissock, C., Lyortsuun, P. (1982) A Guide to Questioning – Classroom Procedures for Teachers. London & Basingstoke: The Macmillan Press Ltd
Maleong, Lexy, J. (1996) Metodologi Penelitian Kualitatif, Bandung: PT Remaja Rosdakarya.
McComas, W., Abraham, L., http://www.usc.edu/programs/cet/private/pdfs/usc/ Asking_Better_Questions.pdf
Mone (2005) National Education Data. Jakarta: MONE.
Moore, A. (2000) Teaching and Learning – Pedagogy, Curriculum, and Culture. London: Routledgefalmer
Vogt, E.E., Brown, J., Isaacs, D. (2003). The Art of Powerful Questions – Catalyzing Insight, Innovation, and Action. http://www.theworldcafe.com/ articles/aopq.pdf
Walsh, J. A., & Sattes, B. D. (2005) Quality Questioning – Research-Based Practice to Engage Every Learner. London: Corwin Press – A Sage Publications Company.
Watkins, C. (2006), Explorations in Metalearning from a Narrative Stance, paper presented at European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction Special Interest Group 16: Metacognition, University of Cambridge, July 19-21
Watkins, C. (2007) Learning about Learning, Chapter 9 in Watkins C, Carnell E and Lodge C, Effective Learning in Classrooms, London, Paul Chapman/Sage
Wragg, E. C., Brown G. (2001) Questioning in the Secondary School. London: Routledgefalmer
Wright & Nuttall. (2000) Working Paper 1: Generic Teaching Issues. Buckinghshire - England: Buckinghamshire County Council Press