In order to answer our question, we
plan to observe the student response to the
teacher’s current questioning techniques.
We plan to directly observe what kinds of
questions the teacher asks throughout class
such as convergent, divergent, rhetorical,
etc. and record our findings. After observing
which questioning techniques the teacher
implements, we will take notice as to which
of these is the most effective in eliciting a
strong response from students. An example
of another influencing factor that could
impact participation could be wait time; this
is not necessarily a questioning technique
but a way to provide students ample time to
process information and formulate a response. We will be recording this
information as well.
Based on the data gathered from our
observations, we will conduct an experiment
to draw relationships between the various
types of questions implemented and how the
students respond to them. This will simply
be done during our lesson by taking a tally
of the number of students that answer each
question type; questions that result in
particularly strong responses will also be
recorded to include in our results. If our data
reflects that the teacher did not get a strong
response from his students, we will
implement other questioning techniques
during our lesson that were not used by the
teacher as well as observe the effects of
other factors such as wait time. By doing so,
we will be able to conclude whether the
students participation is influenced by the
types of questions they are asked and how
they are phrased or possibly another
contributing factor we did not focus on for
our research.