Asking questions is one of the most wonderful strategies to get your students delving deeper into a text. I’ve stumbled upon a wonderful way to get your students to ask questions that will greatly enhance their understanding, allow them to make deeper connections and potentially create a lifelong love of curios exploration.
After you’ve had some lessons aboout questions as a reading strategy, it’s important to talk to your students about the levels of questioning that can occur. Here is a wonderful example:
Oh, wouldn’t it be amazing to have your students asking inventive questions! The joy that will appear on your face when your students asks “if you had a Giving Tree, what would you do differently?” is priceless my friends. I promise you, you can get your students to this deep level of questioning. The first step is to use the wonderful anchor chart above as a start. Here are some other ways to get your students asking critical thinking questions:
Start A Wonder Wall
A wonder wall is a great way to get your students to practice asking questions. They can ask questions about any curriculum topic, not just reading. What’s even greater is that students can take a stab at answering the questions, or sharing theories with each other. This is an informal way to get your students thinking about asking questions as a step towards learning.
Give examples of “thin” & “thick” questions
This is a great way to get your students gaging whether their questions warrant a deeper level of thinking. Give examples of the type of responses critical thinking questions garner, and how they usually sound as well. The anchor chart above is fantastic for this purpose. Also, allow your students to practice asking these questions with your consistent feedback on how they are doing.
Lots of Practice
Let your students have lots of practice not only asking deeper questions, but using texts to answer them as well. Here are some classic ways to practice:
How do you get your students asking meaningful questions?