This week’s readings are about questions. The main purpose of asking questions is to gain information. Asking questions are an important way of communicating with others. All day long we are asking questions or listening to their answers and vice-versa. I don’t think that there is a day that goes by that you don’t ask someone or yourself a question; like: “Is it going to rain? What should I eat for breakfast? What should I wear today? Should I go grocery shopping?”, and so on. I my children also ask me a lot of questions; my favorite one (actually my least favorite one) is “What’s going to be for dinner?” We go through our lives asking and answering questions, and perhaps not even being aware of it. I bet if you had to tally how many times you asked or answered questions it would be very high.
We are also answering many questions throughout the day, such as: “When you go to the store can you pick me up some gum? My child is coughing can I bring him to school? Can you put paper in the Xerox machine? What are you going to do tomorrow? And so on. If you think about it asking questions, listening to responses, and having questions asked of you and you answering them can be more challenging than one might seem. Especially questions that you dread to ask or questions you don’t want to answer and you try to put it off to the very last minute until there are no other excuses until you need to ask or answer it. Those are ones I don’t like.
We are taught as preschool teachers to ask the children “open-ended” questions to encourage the children to give more information than a simple “yes or no” answer. What is also important is to be an active listener when children answer your questions. It can make them feel like you care and believe what they have to say is important. Do you think that you are an active listener to the children, families, co-workers, and your friends and families? Is there a difference to how you listen to “work” related adults, children, and “personal” people? Why is that?
Even in this class we were told to ask questions in our blogs for ourselves and our classmates. Questions can make us have a deeper understanding of what we are thinking about and also what we want to know about. So, what do you think about questions? Do you think that questions are an important means of communicating with others? Why?
Hi Susan,
ReplyDeleteWhat does it mean to be an active listener? Are there different ways to be an active listener? How does being an active listener influence how a teacher responds to children?
Do you think teachers who are not listeners can become active listeners? What might you share with a non-listener in order to inspire listening and response?
Do teachers needs to be taught to question? How do questions relate to active listening?
Jeanne
Hi Susan! In your blog you have mentioned that we ask and answer numerous questions without realizing it. That is so true. We do it automatically. But what about when we have to sit down and actually think about it? Could this be active listening? Or is active listening something else? Children ask questions because they're curious and we try to answer them to help them understand. But is there a certain way to answer a question because they are children?
ReplyDeleteHi Susan,
ReplyDeleteAsking open-ended questions for children to think deeper. It motivate the children to express their ideas. It encourage them to explore new possibilities and help them to clarify their idea to solve problems. During the process, teachers and adults need to be a good listeners. At the same time, we need to ask more questions to help them to move to the next level of group learning. I have difficult time implement group learning for my class. Do you have any idea how to implement this idea into my classroom? They are two years old now. For next term I'll be in a 3 year old classroom.
Aloha,
ReplyDeleteI was wondering what questions are very difficult to ask or to answer? Is putting it off to the last minute going to change the question or the answer of the question? Why do you think certain questions turn out to be avoidance questions and how can we change this kind of thinking? Do you feel that questions can lead to a whole new way of thinking and do you think this is important?
You are correct in saying that questions are asked everyday to numerous to even count how many. By asking questions a lot of times we get another perspective on how someone is thinking or what they are all about! Questions also make things more interesting, especially the ones that make you think outside of your comfort zone or "outside of the box" and especially the ones that can not be answered easily. The ones that make you think, investigate and research for the answers!
Great response and I like how you related active listening to questions. That's awesome. Yes we need to be active listeners as people and especially as teachers, so we can be role models for the children. It is very important! With the busy days that we as teachers have, and as parents, how can we as teachers encourage parents and help them to be active listeners to their children?
ReplyDeleteTo answer your question, I am very aware of being an active listener, and I think that may be because I know how it feels when others dont actively listen. It frustrates me, especially when they come back asking a zillion questions about something I was just telling them. However. with everyone's busy lives and curiosity, their are definitely times that I am unable to be the best active listener and I have to tell them to hold on, etc. in times when you are too busy, don't ignore them or pretend, I say its better to, nicely say, I'm busy can we get back to this in a few minutes.
Hi Susan,
ReplyDeleteWhat do you think about children ask open-ended questions? How do you guide them ask questions with different ways? How you encourage children use open-ended question to ask their peers or adults? What are your challenges to deal with children’s questions about the world around them? How can you support children think about their questions step by step? How do you help them rethink about their question by different ways in life?