How to guide effective student questioning: a review of teacher guidance in primary education

Abstract

Although the educational potential of student questions is widely acknowledged, primary school teachers need support to guide them to become effective for learning the curriculum. The aim of this review is to identify which teacher guidance supports effective student questioning. Thirtysix empirical studies on guiding student questioning in primary education were analysed. Four emer-gent themes for teacher guidance of effective student questioning were identified in the data: first, guiding effective student questioning requires confident teachers, who create a supportive class-room culture for question generation and acknowledge the potential in students' initial questions; second, defining a conceptual focus supports teachers in aligning student questions to curricular goals; third, organising collective responsibility for the question process in the classroom fosters effective student questioning; and fourth, teacher guidance is supported when the process of ques-tioning is visualised on a collective platform.

Using Mind Maps to Make Student Questioning Effective: Learning Outcomes of a Principle-Based Scenario for Teacher Guidance

“…To design a scenario that could support teachers in guiding effective student questioning, first, the literature on the role and effects student questioning was reviewed in previous study (Stokhof et al 2017a). Four design principles emerged that promote and support a classroom culture in which student questioning can effectively occur: (a) define a core curriculum, (b) support question generation, (c) establish a shared responsibility, and (d) visualize collective knowledge construction.…”

“…This awareness of the Bnot-yet known^is expected to elicit students' perplexity and questioning (Greasser & Wisher 2001). Therefore, teachers have a pivotal role in supporting the actual generation of questions (Stokhof et al 2017a). When teachers value all types and levels of student questions as potential contributions to learning, a classroom culture is established in which more student questions emerge which contribute to exploring the curriculum (Beck 1998).…”

“…To support teachers in guiding effective student questioning, a principle-based scenario was developed in a design-based research project (Stokhof et al 2017a, b). A principle-based scenario provides a sequence of pedagogical activities, which supports teachers to translate design-principles into concrete classroom teaching and to make adaptive decisions to accommodate activities to local contexts, needs, and possibilities (cf.…”

“…First, the design-principles for the scenario were identified in a review study (Stokhof et al 2017a). Then, a follow-up study was conducted that focused on the development and refinement of a prototype of the scenario for teacher guidance in several iterations of design, implementation, evaluation, and redesign (Stokhof et al 2017b).…”

Mind Map Our Way into Effective Student Questioning: a Principle-Based Scenario

“…In the generating phase, teachers can support student questioning by activating and extending students' prior knowledge and allowing them to ask questions that arise from personal interest (Stokhof et al 2017). Zeegers (2002) finds that a supportive classroom culture is a prerequisite for question generation.…”