Bringing My A-Game

Rethinking Questions

I love the idea of using questions to teach because if students aren’t engaged, then they won’t care what is coming out of my mouth.  They will only be thinking about when my class is going to end.  Once I lose them, it’s much harder to regain their attention.  Quality questions are important to me as a teacher, because I want my students to know that I and the rest of the class values their thoughts and ideas.  In my practicum, my mentor teacher only asks convergent questions and seems angry when the students don’t answer it the way she expects.  Her classroom is like a one way street with heavy traffic.  You are constantly being pushed in one direction and you can’t slow down enough to notice anything around you. 

Most students have no idea what they think, which is why we are doing them a disservice when we don’t have higher order questions.  Anyone can regurgitate what I tell them 5 minutes ago, but creating questions that require them to filter through their own thoughts allows them to compare and contrast what they think with the literal facts that I give them.  It is through this process that they achieve an awareness of themselves as part of the world.  They have a voice and it is an important one.  Most students don’t know that and teachers are training them think in lazy ways, only giving what is absolutely necessary. 

I like that QtA encourages students to go beyond what they are reading.  I think that students think that if they read it in a book, it must be the final word on that subject.  They need to know that authors are not infallible and should be challenged.  A piece of writing is simply a tool for students to build on their ideas and a great way for students to realize this is through discussion that is organized in a way by the teacher so that students are making intended connections.  As important as it is for teachers to ask students “thinking” questions, it is just as important for teachers to teach how to come up with questions that further their learning.  It is really empowering to view myself as a thinker, and this was something never carried over in my school age years.  I never thought of myself as someone who could think in a way that would generate questions to increase my knowledge.  This is something that I would love to change in my own students. 

Note Taking as a Strategy to Learn

I admit up front that I am a terrible note taker, so this chapter immediately sparked an interest for me.  I can remember the first time that I took notes and that was in my 7^th grade social studies class.  Every day when we walked in the room, Mr. Johnson was just finishing writing the notes we were to copy on the blackboard.  The entire board was filled with sentences just waiting for us to write down.  There was absolutely no teaching involved, and this was my first introduction to note taking.  It was no wonder then, why I evolved into a student who hated taking notes.  I had no schema for it as an actual skill that provided anything besides regurgitation at a later time. 

I totally agree with the authors when they say that it is the teacher’s responsibility to set the student up for successful note taking.  I have been in too many classes where the teachers are setting students up for failure by having an apathetic view towards their students’ ability to take notes effectively.  Just as students should be taught how to take notes, perhaps teachers should be taught how to teach in a way that allows notes to be taken!  I think I see a professional development day in the future…  I think the key to teaching good note taking skills is intentionality.  It is important to be deliberate in every part of a lesson plan to set students up for successful note taking. 

I really like all the different strategies that were presented in the chapter, but coming from someone with bad experiences in note taking skills, I felt a little nervous looking at the chart forms.  I just have to wonder if someone that hasn’t developed the skill of note taking might spend more time trying to figure out where to put their notes than synthesizing the information they are given.  Is practice the only way that we can prevent this from happening?