After reviewing literature concerning encouraging students’ questioning in the classroom, I have found few recent studies. The newest studies on encouraging student questions in the classroom are from the 1990s and early 2000s. There are plenty of studies on the inquiry and PBL models in the classroom, but these do not focus specifically on encouraging questions when not conducting inquiry and PBL units. My focus is on this latter aspect of student generated questions.
Early studies such as Alison King’s study in 1994, and Christine Chin’s study in 2002 and found similar reasons for encouraging questions in the classroom. Specifically, Chin found, “the act of asking questions and the consequent search for answers is key to active learning. The formulation of a good question is also a creative act, and at the heart of what doing science is all about. Hence, students should be encouraged to ask questions as this facilitates learning.” (King, 1994) (Chin & Brown, 2002) Regarding encouraging more quality questions in the classroom, one study in particular, caught my attention. My study focusses on the effect of positive behavior rewards on the quantity of quality questions that students ask. The positive behavior reward is subtle and socially based. In Can Children Catch Curiosity From a Social Robot Susan Engel, et al. show that by manipulating a robot as a peer to give subtle social cues, children’s curiosity levels do increase. (Gordon, Breazeal, & Engel, 2015) The authors state their research suggests, “that manipulating subtle social interaction utterances and expressions can impact children’s curiosity.” The similarities between this study and my proposed study, whether a positive behavior reward may influence curiosity, are intriguing. Another study, Mark-On: Encouraging Student Questions in Class, studied the effect of minimizing “the psychological stress and cultural norms that inhibit active participation” in class by using an app, Mark-On, to encourage more student questions. This study, although it had similar goals, used technology to minimize the psychological stress of asking questions, while not directly addressing the classroom cultural norms. The study did show, however, that students did have questions that needed to be asked to increase students learning, and, interestingly, by asking questions, students felt more confident to ask further classroom questions. (Jung, Kim, & So, 2016) This result encourages my study into changing the classroom cultural norms by encouraging more quality questions. Another study, Preschoolers' Search for Explanatory Information Within Adult-Child Conversation, looked at why children ask questions. Contrary to the belief among many annoyed adults when confronted with an abundance of questions from a preschooler, The authors found that asking questions is a search for answers, not annoyance! (Frazier, Gelman, & Wellman, 2009) In the middle school, many teachers with their huge content and skill based standards that they need teach, neglect the questions. This may be why Warren Berger found that the numbers of questions that children ask decrease exponentially the longer that the student is in school. (Berger, 2014) Yet, Tony Wagner of Harvard and the Learning Policy Institute states that we in education need to encourage more questions more often (Wagner, 2016). Both of the above studies are focussed on Children ages three to six. I could find no studies of middle school children. To further study questioning and learning, I needed to review college studies. On such study, Improving Learning Through Interventions of Student-Generated Questions and Concept Maps, showed how student learning improved when students were asked to generate at least three questions per week (Berry & Chew, 2008). My review of the literature shows a need to study how to increase the quantity of quality questions that middle school students ask.
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“What the best and wisest parent wants for his own child, that must we want for all children in the community. Any other ideal for our schools is narrow and unlovely; acted upon, it destroys our democracy”
Some of the best work in education comes from magnet school and charter schools (unfortunately, when poorly implemented, some of the worst also comes from these schools). In the best case, charter schools do what Darling-Hammond suggest- they implement education at the school level to meet the needs of the students in a decentralized atmosphere. The more I read and about learning, creativity and the brain, the more I am impressed with the charter schools that I am most aware of: Stone Bridge School in Napa and Health Sciences High and Middle College in San Diego. Both schools do what Darling-Hammond recommend. The schools set for themselves and their students:
The equitable and adequate resources will require federal, state, and local attention to opportunity-to-learn standards. These sound great! What I want to know, however, is what these may look like in the real world of the United States. I think this may be done, but the standards that we compare ourselves to, Finland, Korea, and Singapore, are very different to what we have here. Their populations are much smaller and their percent of population that are of the dominant ethnic group or language are much bigger. These differences may be significant. First my colleagues, a query:
For my research study, I may go decidedly low tech. I am tallying the numbers of questions and quality questions that students ask in a given period. (Rubric) I can tally using an online tally system, but as I teach, I do not carry my computer. I could use a smartphone app such as Advanced Tally Counter. This would be easy because of the small space needed and I do carry my phone with me in my pocket. My fear is that since my students rarely see me use a smartphone in class, it may distract them. My thought, then, is to tally using a paper, clipboard, and pencil. My peers, what do you think? I could let the students know that I am recording certain data about the classroom environment.
Is modeling an alternative use of a phone besides texting, phoning, gaming, social media use, and watching videos enough to warrant pulling my phone out of my pocket? Methodology For this research study I have divided my four core world history classes so that I give a treatment of a positive behavior reward to two of my classes, while not giving the treatment to two other classes. I have chosen to give the treatments to my first and third period classes which have a similar demographic profile to my second and fifth period classes, who will receive no treatment. Starting on a Monday, I will record the numbers of questions that students ask per period over a week-long study. The week-long study consists of three 50 minute classes and one 90 minute block period. Further, I will also record the numbers of quality questions, as measured against a rubric, that the students ask per period over that same week-long study. I will record these using a tally system. The most unobtrusive method of recording the tally is keeping a hand tally on a sheet of paper divided into two columns: one for all questions, one for quality questions.This is the method that I may use. Alternatively, there are many smartphone apps which may also be useful. A simple, free app that works well is Advanced Tally Counter (for Android systems). Since I rarely pull out my phone during class, I think that this may distract the students. In my treatment classes, students who ask quality questions will be rewarded with their names written on the board; they will earn the right to line up early at the door before dismissal. This free, to the teacher, reward is of high value to most seventh grade students. If a student asks a second question during the same week, they will get a check next to their name and earn the right to line up early and invite a friend (again high value; no cost). If a student continues asking quality questions, they will earn additional checks and herbal tea for the class period. This low cost reward may inspire especially during these colder fall days. I will transfer my data into a Google Sheet to analyse the results. A WOW moment at the end of many minor wow moments.
A reminder that people are "punished be rewards" (Alfie Kohn, 1993). My project looks at the use of rewards to change student behavior. So twentieth century of me. But is it? Curiosity, that most powerful of twenty-first century skills, is what I am hoping to rekindle in the minds of my seventh graders. Can an brief, small reward really motivate curiosity? Can I use social rewards of lining up at the door with their friends to motivate more quality questions? Is hot tea or the chance to create a work of art with their peers using only a large block of wood, a hammer and nails an extrinsic motivator that will motivate or demotivate my students? Daniel Pink points out that the larger the reward, the poorer the performance (Daniel Pink, The Puzzle of Motivation, 2009). Pink points out extrinsic rewards can work short term on mechanistic work; can changing a class culture to one that supports curiosity be seen as mechanistic? Ken Robinson suggests that leadership is about climate control. Is my study misplaced? Am I testing the behavior modification of positive rewards, or am I testing if I can change the climate in my classroom through encouraging more quality questions. My new climate will attempt to create the autonomy that Pink states leads to motivation, while meeting one of Robinson's three principals on which life flourishes: curiosity. Can I create the climate that allows for Robinson's "seeds of possibility" to grow (How to Escape Education's Death Valley, 2013). By encouraging student questions, I can then provide answers or lead them to where they can find answers. This may allow them to build their discipline box of the subject that I teach. They can then synthesize the information and make it their own. Without these first steps, the student cannot use their creative mind to think outside of the box. Gardner states, "you have to have a box before you can go outside of it" (Howard Gardner, Five Minds of the Future, 2007). Finally, I want to create a "culture of learning that thrives on participatory life long learning" (John Seely Brown, A new culture of Learning in a world of Constant Flux, 2010). What if... thinking beyond this semester of work, I motivate with chances for 20% time, or FedEx days in my classroom? Bringing it back to Daniel Pink's challenge, I can find a better motivator- rooted in human nature and based on autonomy, mastery, and purpose! |
About MeAfter teaching for 20 years, I've decided to pursue a master's degree! Archives
July 2017
CategoriesThis is me working on my classwork... usually at night after the heater is off.... sitting long times makes me cold!
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