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Let’s talk about open-ended questions. What do you know about open-ended questions? What do you think about using open-ended questions? How might open-ended questions affect your classroom discussions? How might open-ended questions affect language acquisition? What could change if we asked more open-ended questions?

Open-ended questions are questions that require more than a yes/no or one word response (Bond & Wasik, 2009).

Open-ended questions create greater possibility for expanded learning and perspective taking. Through questioning we begin to discover, create dialogue, and exercise creativity. If asking good questions has so much importance, why do we stick to the basic “WH” questions in our instruction of children who are deaf and hard of hearing? One reason, highlighted by Vogt, Brown, & Isaacs (2003) may be that much of Western culture, and North American society in particular, focuses on having the “right answer” rather than discovering the “right question.

We treat question asking with young children as a checklist, looking for particular answers that demonstrate knowledge. We don’t naturally move beyond these questions to higher-level inquiry where thoughtfulness, analysis, comprehension, and inquisitiveness can be demonstrated. Do we feel limited by the language of the children we work with? How will they develop these skills if we never pose the questions?

Consider this: a powerful question…

generates curiosity in the listener
stimulates reflective conversation
is thought-provoking
surfaces underlying assumptions
invites creativity and new possibilities
generates energy and forward movement
channels attention and focuses inquiry
stays with children and adults after the conversation has ended
connects to a deep meaning
evokes more questions (this is my favorite part!)

One activity that lends itself well to asking open-ended questions is to show unusual photos and let the questions flow. These photos can be found on Pinterest or through a quick Google search. Collect your chosen pictures and plan a few starter questions to get the conversation flowing. I can hardly imagine all the language you can sample during this activity!

Bond & Wasik (2009) shared their observation that asking open ended questions provides opportunities for the teacher to engage children in conversations and allows children to talk and use language with meaning. Children have an opportunity to put what they have learned into action and demonstrate their understanding in a more dynamic, interactive way compared to typical “WH” questions. If we only ever ask questions such as, “Is the character a boy or a girl?” the children may not learn that “who” means a person or animal. But taking this a step further, posing “tell me about the characters” or “tell me about the story” leads to greater ownership of comprehension by the child. You can then follow up with comments that confirm or correct their answers.

So where are open-ended questions leading us?

Assuming I have convinced you to give more consideration to the types of questions you are asking, let’s talk about HOW we are asking the questions. Here are a few tips:

Acoustic Highlighting: be mindful of which words you are emphasizing and how that can skew the questioning. Sometimes we want to do this and sometimes we don’t! This strategy will be discussed deeper in a later blog post.
Timing: knowing that open-ended questions spark discussion (and more questions) consider when you are using them. For example, the beginning, middle, or end of your read aloud. We don’t want to cut off an insightful line of questioning just because we aren’t going to finish a read-aloud. Not saying you can’t ask open-ended questions at the beginning, just allow the time for them to be explored fully.
Wait Time: awareness of our rate of speech, our purposeful pauses as we wait for answers, and our associated expectant look all work to increase the effectiveness of open-ended questions. Another strategy to be discovered in depth in a different post.
Preparation: it would behoove all of us to plan our intended questions and have them written and accessible during lessons. Post-it notes inside read-alouds, for example. Something to keep us on track and hold us accountable for asking powerful questions!
Scaffolding: children won’t always be able to answer open-ended questions so we will need to teach this skill. Explicitly teaching and modeling the thought process together with chaining from closed set questions will get us there.
Taxonomy: if you need to know more about chaining question types for scaffolding, check out this article!

I leave you with a question: (straight from Vogt, Brown & Isaacs)…

What is the question we should be asking next?

And the link to download the handout with more examples of powerful questions!