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Getting Students to Ask Questions
Fri Dec 11, 2015 2:29 PM
[sub]The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. —Albert Einstein [/sub]
[sub]One integral element of NGSS is getting students to ask questiions, because asking questions is ventral to inquiry and learning in general. Science investigation in its’ most basic form is asking questions, and teaching children how to ask questions. Children are often described as natural scientists and their curiosity as a basic human trait. As science teachers, we must be invested in having all their students use this process skill. [/sub]
[sub]My question is, what are some strategies you get your students to create and ask their own questions?[/sub]
630 Activity Points
Fri Jan 29, 2016 10:26 AM
I know that you posted this a long time ago but one strategy we use is to do activities, demos, and labs that don't start the way the students expect. The first part of the activity is set up as really just following the directions....no inquiry. But it sets the stage for something to happen that is surprising to the students. And then the next part asks them to think of questions that they want to know about after seeing that first piece. So they are using their curiosity.
An very simple example of one we use is the M&M in water. The first piece asks what they think will happen to an M&M in a petri dish of water. They almost all guess that the color will bleed off into the water, which is correct. The next piece asks if you put two different M&Ms an inch apart in a petri dish of water what will happen? They almost all guess that the two colors will mix in the middle. But what really happens is exactly opposite of that. And then that starts the curiosity and questions.
Hope that helps some.
530 Activity Points
Mon Feb 08, 2016 12:52 PM
A way that I would use to get students to ask questions in science is allowing a fun schema activation to take place. When you ask them something that the child is familiar with first, they are more likely to respond. Also, allow some reward for answering questions so that the classroom is more inclined to do so.
190 Activity Points
Sun Feb 21, 2016 10:44 PM
It's interesting because students (I teach 4th grade) seem to have an unending supply of questions during the "teaching time" of all my lessons - not science in particular, either. I am talking about the whole "To" part of the "To-With-By" model for lessons. And I really try to keep that part quick so we can move on to the engagement part of things. So I always build expectations around them just listening for those ten minutes or so and saving questions for after. To curb some of this, I try to encourage them to put questions in the "Parking Lot" (which is just a chart paper they can put sticky notes on) for us to get to later.
Interestingly, when it is science time and I ask them to come up with questions to lead an investigation or to build a research topic about, it is like pulling teeth. I think it scares them that maybe their question won't be "right" or "good enough." So, maybe what I should be trying is the parking lot approach for science questioning - not just as a placeholder for when we can't get to something, but as a non-threatening brainstorming activity where they have had success in the past!
290 Activity Points
Tue Jul 19, 2016 8:12 PM
I always ask my students to think about things they are observing and consider what is happening and why--and then frame their observations as questions they can explore using more inquiry-based thinking. For example, with my summer campers, more than one of the students has remarked about how hot it is outside. I once replied back that it felt so hot out you could probably cook an egg on the sidewalk. My kids were thrilled--can you really cook eggs on the sidewalk? We put together a solar oven and decided to see if we really could use the sun to cook things. We made S'mores and although it took a lot longer than cooking over a campfire, they melted down and we were able to see how the sun can be turned into energy, while the kids got to enjoy a tasty treat. I heard a lot of great verbal observations, so I wrote a lot of them down and then had the students think about how we could frame them as questions to find out more. Having something to base their questions off of seemed to really help encourage more critical thinking. They would mention something and then another student would go "Oh yeah, when we did that, how come this happened?" I think it's important to give all the students a baseline experience that they can build off of, a common experience that can provide richer questioning. It's something recent, and it's something shared that all the students saw in progress.
545 Activity Points
Sun Jul 31, 2016 8:37 AM
I tend to use the flipped classroom strategy. I give my students a topic to search at home and the next day we have discussions related to the topic. I feel that they tend to ask more questions that way.
125 Activity Points
Sat Sep 10, 2016 10:47 AM
Good information on NGSS, Next Generation Science Standards are K–12 science content standards. Standards set the expectations for what students should know and be able to do. NGSS were developed by states to improve science education for all students. I think these standards give local educators the flexibility to design classroom learning experiences that stimulate students’ interests in science and prepares them for college, careers, and citizenship. Diana Jeff
20 Activity Points
Tue Sep 27, 2016 11:13 PM
How do you get your students to ask meaningful questions?
I wonder this myself, and as another reply mentioned, it seems like children are constantly asking questions- until you ask them to ask questions about a specific topic, then they become worried that there might be a 'wrong' question! In searching online, I found an article about inquiry-based learning that addresses this on a few levels (link below). A teacher describes her approach in the classroom, one strategy is that she keeps the line of inquiry aligned with student interests, for example, uses tweets to teach grammar. This can be modified for science classrooms with some creativity.
The main idea from this article that I will be keeping in mind in my future classroom is that the students will get off track in their excitement, but at least they are excited! Let them be excited, and as a good teacher, learn to ask your own questions to begin to steer them toward a middle-ground where your objectives meet their interests. "The true art of teaching is to ask the right questions, become a thought partner (interaction during instruction), and then assist in students' discoveries." http://www.edutopia.org/blog/inquiry-based-learning-asking-right-questions-georgia-mathis
From experience, focusing on making students comfortable is helpful in getting them to speak up during a discussion. Relating concepts to ones they are already familiar with such as foods, activities, songs, clothes they are culturally aware of at home or friends' houses, enables them to speak with confidence.
615 Activity Points
Thu Dec 01, 2016 9:41 PM
It is important to make sure kids feel safe and comfortable from the beginning of the school year. The atmosphere created will have a lot to do with how willing students allow themselves to take risks and raise questions. I have seen a teacher who uses a "Parking Lot" chart to give students a place to anonymously ask questions. Each student is given a parking spot with a number. Students are able to write questions or comments and place them on their parking spots at any time during a lesson. Exit cards may work well to have students ask questions or express how comfortable they feel with a topic, etc.
765 Activity Points
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