Use Questioning to Extend Students' Thinking
When questioning students, teachers need to require more than simple recall. While recall of facts is important, teachers should actively and systematically plan to extend students' thinking by asking questions that move beyond recall. The following list (obtained from the Maryland State Department of Education) is a hierarchy of questions based on Bloom's taxonomy that teachers can use to extend students' thinking. Teachers can use this classification system to evaluate their own questioning behavior and determine whether they are relying on only lower-level recall questions or are engaging students cognitively through the use of increasingly challenging questions.
Recall questions: Ask students who, what, when, where, and why.
Comparison questions: How is (...) similar to or different from (...)?
Identifying attributes: What are the characteristics or parts of (...)?
Classifying questions: How might you classify (...) into categories?
Ordering questions: Arrange (...) into a sequence according to (...).
Identifying relationships and patterns: Create an outline, diagram, or web of (...).
Representing: What other ways might we show or illustrate (...).
Identifying main ideas: What is the key concept in (...)? Restate the main idea of (...) in your own words.
Identifying errors: What's wrong with (...)?
Inferring: What can you infer from (...)? What conclusions can be drawn from (...)?
Predicting: What might happen if (...)?
Elaborating: What ideas or details can you add to (...)? Give an example of (...).
Summarizing: Can you summarize (...)?
Establishing criteria: What criteria would you use to judge or evaluate (...)?
Verifying: What evidence supports (...)? How might we confirm or disconfirm (...)?
Teachers can encourage critical thinking by asking questions that require students to think beyond the recall of facts. Using the previous classifications, the teacher can challenge students to engage cognitively in sport and physical activities. Application questions such as "when do you think you would use the crossover dribble in field hockey or basketball?" or evaluation questions such as "why does a football receiver who uses feinting or faking have an advantage?" or "why does stepping with opposition help you throw harder?" can stimulate students to think more deeply and, thefore, understand and retain information better.
Excerpt from Designing Effective Instructional Tasks for Physical Education and Sports, by David C. Griffey and Lynn D. Housner
