Using questioning to enhance student engagement

United States Military Acadett at West Point, US 

Questioning techniques constitute a substantial component of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) ExCEEd (Excellence in Civil Engineering Education) Teaching Workshop—a six-day faculty development experience that is entirely focused on 

We find, however, that many teachers who question the value of questioning have never actually tried it. Others have made half-hearted attempts to teach interactively—but have quickly given up when their students were unresponsive or, worse yet, when students answered every question with I don t know. Some teachers use questioning in an adversarial way— to identify students who have not done their homework, for example and then wonder why these same students react negatively to questioning. 

In this paper, I suggest that questioning is one of the most valuable tools in the teacher s toolbox. Questioning can significantly increase student engagement, stimulate critical thinking, and enhance interpersonal rapport between the teacher and student. But like any tool, it needs to be used for an appropriate purpose and like any tool, it must be learned before it can be used effectively. 

Lowman also proposes a powerful, empirically derived model of teaching excellence. Based on the research question, What constitutes exemplary teaching this model was derived by culling the adjectives from over 500 teaching award nominations of faculty members widely acknowledged to be exemplary teachers. Lowman s research team found that these adjectives fell naturally into two statistically independent categories, which the research team labeled as intellectual excitement and interpersonal rapport. To be exemplary, the teacher must excel in both of these domains. 

---