What We Know

A teacher's questions impact student achievement, retention and participation. They fulfill numerous instructional purposes including: assessing understanding, reviewing and summarizing, developing critical and creative thinking skills and inspiring interest and motivation. Research has shown that an absence of questioning during teaching results in lower achievement levels than instruction that features questioning (Cotton, 1989).

Questions should focus on the important content to be learned in order to maximize understanding and not distract from it (Marzano et al, 2001; Cotton, 1989). Teachers need to be aware of the level of questions they ask according to the revised version of Bloom's Taxonomy (Cotton, 1993; Cotton, 1989):

Most questions posed by teachers generate lower-level cognition, though studies show that a combination of lower- and higher-order questions is most effective for most students beyond the primary grades (Cotton, 1989; McREL, 2002).  Higher-level questions yield deeper levels of learning (Marzano et al., 2001). Lower-level questions are more effective with students in grades kindergarten through grade two, especially disadvantaged children.

Posing questions at the start of a lesson, discussion or reading is effective for learning factual information, as is asking questions frequently throughout, particularly for learning factual information (Marzano et al, 2001; Cotton, 1989). Wait time is related to effective questioning. Providing students with time to think before being called on to answer is an effective technique (Marzano et al 2001).