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The Power of Question Formulation for Lifelong Learning

Sarah Westbrook

Director of Professional Learning

The Right Question Institute

Sarah.westbrook@rightquestion.org, @Sarah RQI

rightquestion.org

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Who is in the room?

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To Access Today’s Materials:

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Access RQI’s Free QFT Resources

https://rightquestion.org/education/resources

Classroom Examples

Instructional Videos

Planning Tools & Templates

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Use and Share These Resources

The Right Question Institute offers materials through a Creative Commons License. You are welcome to use, adapt, and share our materials for noncommercial use, as long as you include the following reference:

“Source: The Question Formulation Technique (QFT) was created by the Right Question Institute (rightquestion.org).”

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4 Week Free Online Course: Find out more at rightquestion.org

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Learning with Teachers & Students

How did Nevada come to be?

Why didn’t the snow melt with the glacier?

QFT-Primary Source Lesson snapshots available at rightquestion.org

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Today’s Agenda

Welcome
Why Spend Time on Teaching the Skill of Question Formulation?
Collaborative Learning with the Question Formulation Technique (QFT)
Explore Real Classroom Examples & Applications
Why is Question Formulation Important Now?
Q&A

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Why spend time teaching the skill of question formulation?

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Origin of the Right Question Institute: �Parents in Lawrence, Massachusetts, 1990

“We don’t go to the school because we don’t even know what to ask.”

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"There is no learning without having to pose a question."

- Richard Feynman

Nobel Laureate, Physics, 1965

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– Stuart Firestein

Former chair, Department of Biology,

Columbia University

“We must teach students how to think in questions, how to manage ignorance.”

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College Presidents on�What College Students Should Learn

“The primary skills should be analytical skills of interpretation and inquiry. In other words, know how to frame a question.”

- Leon Botstein, President of Bard College

“…the best we can do for students is have them ask the right questions.”

- Nancy Cantor, Former Chancellor of University of Illinois

The New York Times, August 4, 2002

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Yet, Only 27% of Graduates Believe College Taught Them How to Ask Their Own Questions

Alison Head, Project Information Literacy at University of Washington, 2016

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But, the problem begins long before college…�

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Question Asking Declines with Age

Tizard, B., Hughes, M., Carmichael, H., & Pinkerton, G. (1983).

Pearson, J.C. & West, R. (2009)

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Which students ask questions?

Tizard, B., Hughes, M., Carmichael, H., & Pinkerton, G. (1983)

Carter, A., Croft, A., Lukas, D., Sandstrom, G. (2017).

First: Tizard, B., Hughes, M., Carmichael, H., & Pinkerton, G. (1983). Children’s questions and adults’ answers. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 24, 269-281.

Girls (mean age 3 years 11 months) from working class and middle class families asked 24 and 29 questions per hour at home, respectively. At school, these same girls asked on average 1.4 and 3.7 questions per hour (working and middle class, respectively)

Second:

Good, T. L., Slavings, R. L., Harel, K., Emerson, H. (1987). Student Passivity: A Study of Question Asking in K-12 Classrooms. Sociology of Education, 60, 187 & 189.

Classroom observations made across 22 k-12 classrooms which tracked students’ question asking behavior showed that in upper grades, low-achieving students ask fewer questions in a 50 minute class period than other students. : On average, high achieving students asked 3.7X the number of questions middle and low achieving students asked in the high school grades.

Quote from study: The data in Table 2 indicate that low achievers in upper grades ask fewer questions than younger low achievers. Tables 2 and 3 also show that low-achieving students continue to be active participants through the third grade; however, by the sixth grade, they have become relatively passive. The data thus support the view that low-achieving elementary students learn to avoid asking questions in the classroom. In higher grades, it is clear that low-achieving students ask fewer questions in class than other students.

�

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We can work together on creating more opportunities for all students to ask their own questions�

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We Are Not Alone

More than 1 million classrooms worldwide

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What happens when students do learn to ask their own questions?�

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Research Confirms �the Importance of Questioning

Self-questioning (metacognitive strategy):

Student formulation of their own questions is one of the most effective metacognitive strategies
Engaging in pre-lesson self-questioning improved students rate of learning by nearly 50% (Hattie, p.193)

John Hattie

Visible Learning: A Synthesis of Over 800

meta-Analyses Relating to Achievement, 2008

UC Davis Research Linking Curiosity to Memory (UC Davis) 2014

The Fullerton Longitudinal Study (FLS), a 30-plus year study of the development of giftedness across various points in time conducted by Adele and Allen Gottfried of California State University ”This finding has strong implications for the development of STEM considering that curiosity is a fundamental predictor of the aspiration to become a scientist.”

S. von Stumm, B. Hell, T. Chamorro-Premuzic. The Hungry Mind: Intellectual Curiosity Is the Third Pillar of Academic Performance. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 2011 meta-analysis shows They found that curiosity did, indeed, influence academic performance. In fact, it had quite a large effect, about the same as conscientiousness. When put together, conscientiousness and curiosity had as big an effect on performance as intelligence.

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Student Reflection

“The way it made me feel was smart because I was asking good questions and giving good answers.”

-Boston 9^th grade summer school student

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Today’s Agenda

Welcome & Community Building
Why Spend Time on Teaching the Skill of Question Formulation?
Collaborative Learning with the Question Formulation Technique (QFT)
Explore Real Classroom Examples & Applications
Why is Question Formulation Important Now?
Q&A

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Collaborative Learning with the Question Formulation Technique (QFT)

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There are 2 icons you will see:

Use the chat box to share some of your work

Please think or work on the task assigned

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The Question Formulation Technique (QFT)

Individuals learn to:

Produce their own questions
Improve their questions
Strategize on how to use their questions
Reflect on what they have learned and how they learned it

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Rules for Producing Questions

1. Ask as many questions as you can

2. Do not stop to answer, judge, or discuss

3. Write down every question exactly as stated

4. Change any statements into questions

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Produce Questions

Ask Questions
Follow the Rules

Ask as many questions as you can.
Do not stop to answer, judge, or discuss.
Write down every question exactly as it was stated.
Change any statements into questions.

Number the Questions

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Question Focus

🡪Now, ask questions. Number the questions. Follow the rules:

Ask as many questions as you can.

Don’t stop to answer, judge, or discuss.

Record each question exactly as it was stated (or first came to mind).

Change any statements into questions.

Some students are not asking questions.

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Categorize Questions: Closed/Open

Definitions:

Closed-ended questions can be answered with a “yes” or “no” or with a one-word answer.
Open-ended questions require

more explanation.

Directions: Identify your questions as closed-ended or open-ended by marking them with a “C” or an “O.”

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Discuss

Closed-ended Questions

Advantages

Disadvantages

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Discuss

Open-ended Questions

Advantages

Disadvantages

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Improve Questions

Take one closed-ended question and change it into an open-ended question.

Take one open-ended question and change it into a closed-ended question.��

Add these as new questions to your list

Closed

Open

Closed

Open

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Prioritize Questions

Review your list of questions

Choose three questions that you feel are most important.
While prioritizing, think about your Question Focus, Some students are not asking questions.
Then, think about why you chose those questions.

After prioritizing, use the chat box to share ONE of your priority questions.

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Action Plan

In order to answer your priority questions:

What do you need to know? Information
What do you need to do? Tasks

Write down a couple ideas you have.

After prioritizing, use the chat box to share ONE possible action step.

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Reflect

What did you learn?
How did you learn it?
How could you use it in your work?

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A Look Inside the Process

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The QFT, on one slide…

Question Focus
Produce Your Questions

Follow the rules
Number your questions

Improve Your Questions

Categorize questions as Closed or Open-ended
Change questions from one type to another

Strategize

Prioritize your questions
Action plan or discuss next steps
Share

Reflect

Ask as many questions as you can
Do not stop to discuss, judge or answer
Record exactly as stated
Change statements into questions

Closed-Ended:

Answered with “yes,” “no” or one word

Open-Ended: Require longer explanation

Source: The Right Question Institute rightquestion.org

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Three thinking abilities

with one process

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Thinking in many different directions

Divergent

Thinking

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Narrowing Down, Focusing

Convergent

Thinking

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Thinking about Thinking

Metacognition

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Today’s Agenda

Welcome & Community Building
Why Spend Time on Teaching the Skill of Question Formulation?
Collaborative Learning with the Question Formulation Technique (QFT)
Explore Real Classroom Examples & Applications
Why is Question Formulation Important Now?
Q&A

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Exploring Classroom Examples

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Classroom Example: �Kindergarten

Teacher: Jennifer Shaffer, Walkersville, MD

Topic: Non-fiction literacy

Purpose: To engage students prior to reading a nonfiction text about alligators

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Question Focus

Photograph by Nuwan Samaranayake, 2013

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Student Questions

Is the alligator camouflaged?
Why do the babies have stripes?
Are those baby crocodiles?
Is it a mom or dad crocodile?
What is the green stuff?
Why are they in the water so low?

Where are they going?
Why are the baby alligator’s eyes white and the mom’s black?
Why are baby alligators on top of the momma alligator?
Why does momma or daddy have bumps on them?

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Virtual Classroom Example: 7^th Grade

Teacher: Melissa Lawson, Folsom, CA

Topic: Japanese American Internment during World War II

Purpose: To help students engage with primary sources to begin a research process.

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Question Focus

Lange, Dorothea. (1942) Oakland, CA, Mar. 1942.

A large sign reading "I am an American" placed in the window of a store on December 8, the day after Pearl Harbor. The store was closed following orders to persons of Japanese descent to evacuate from certain West Coast areas.

[Photograph] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/cph.3a24566/.

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Selected Questions

Why is the car there?
Who was the owner of the car?
Is that a BMW or something?
Where is this?
Who took the photograph?
Why is there a sign that says, I am an American?
Who is “I”?
What does "Wanto Co.," mean?
Who wrote the "I Am an American" sign?
Was the 'I am American' because the owner was of Japanese heritage and defending him/herself from prosecution? (after Pearl Harbor)
When the picture was taken, was the store open or closed?
Why was this picture taken?
What year is this from?
Who decided to close the store?
What happened to the store after this?
What happened to the Japanese Americans?
Did they ever get full fledged justice?

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Asking and Answering via Padlet

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Student Reflections

“I learned that we cannot draw conclusions just by looking at a picture once. You can look at it and ask questions to learn more. I am wondering if we can use this technique on other things.”
“Not only did I learn about the picture we were analyzing, but I learned that asking questions makes me want to think more and it makes me curious. Once I started asking questions and reading other peoples responses, I was very interested and curious about the questions that were posted.”
“I learned that I should have been using this for my History Day paper.”

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Make Your Own Padlet

Access the QFT Padlet Template Here:

https://padlet.com/sarahwestbrook1/QFT2

Access all of RQI’s Virtual Learning Resources:

https://rightquestion.org/remote-learning-resources/

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Classroom Example: High School

Teacher: Daniel Fouts, Des Plaines, IL

Topic: 12^th Grade Government unit on the American presidency at moments of crisis

Purpose: To engage students at the start of the unit and to help students select a topic for an independent project

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Question Focus

“Nearly all men can handle adversity; but if you really want to test a man’s character, give him power.”

https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/96522529/

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Student Questions

How does power challenge one’s morality?
Should everyone have some type of power?
Does power make people corrupt?
What if the person who is is qualified for power doesn’t attain it?
How is a man’s power tested?
What is considered power?
What defines good character?
How can we ensure that the good men get the power?

What kind of man can handle adversity?
What can power tell us about a man’s character?
How can power be obtained by adversity?
Why are some people affected by power differently?
If adversity supposedly makes you stronger, does that mean that power makes you weaker?

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Next Steps

Each student selected l question from the class list to work on throughout the unit
Students answered their question using research and knowledge from the unit in a two-page reflection paper
Students shared their reflections in a class discussion on the final day of the unit

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Today’s Agenda

Welcome & Community Building
Why Spend Time on Teaching the Skill of Question Formulation?
Collaborative Learning with the Question Formulation Technique (QFT)
Explore Real Classroom Examples & Applications
Why is Question Formulation Important Now?
Q&A

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Why is the skill of question formulation so important now?

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– Clive Thompson

Journalist and Technology Blogger

“How should you respond when you get powerful new tools for finding answers?

Think of harder questions.”

In the Age of Google

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Questions and Democracy

“We need to be taught to study rather than to believe, to inquire rather than to affirm.”

– Septima Clark

Chapter 6 on Septima Clark in Freedom Road: Adult Education of African Americans (Peterson, 1996)

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Thank you!

What are your questions?

rightquestion.org

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4 Week Free Online Course: Find out more at rightquestion.org

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Learning with Teachers & Students

How did Nevada come to be?

Why didn’t the snow melt with the glacier?

QFT-Primary Source Lesson snapshots available at rightquestion.org

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“Source: The Question Formulation Technique (QFT) was created by the Right Question Institute (rightquestion.org).”

Using & Sharing RQI’s Resources

Access the full library of resources: http://rightquestion.org/education/resources