Learning How to Ask Questions

01For VOA Learning English, this is the Education Report.

02Suzanne Meyer, the Assistant Director of the English Language Institute at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, says that many students need to develop critical thinking skills.

03In other words, students need to learn how to collect information and then evaluate the information and apply it to a new context.

04She says, We need to get students actively engaged in inquiry from the beginning levels on into those levels where they really are close to professional and university context.

05One way to develop critical thinking skills, Meyer says, is to teach students to be creative about the types of questions that they ask.

06Meyer says that there are many benefits to using question-asking activities with English learners.

07Question-asking activities help students to become better language learners.

08She says, Question-asking overall helps students be better language learners.

09And not for the obvious, because you ask a question and you get an answer, but often questions are the first point of contact.

10And so if my question is not good, then that's going to direct the level of our conversation.

11Meyer also says that question-asking may help develop critical thinking skills by allowing for more interactions.

12People who can ask questions are very confident.

13And when you're confident, you can have more interaction.

14That extra interaction might lead to critical thinking, because you're more likely to actually integrate in some fashion into a new setting if you're in an ESL scenario.

15So I think overall, just that whole question-asking idea has just so many benefits.

16There are many strategies to improve question-asking and develop critical thinking skills.

17One possible strategy, says Meyer, is to use question-asking patterns that start with concrete questions and move to abstract questions.

18So, for example, if students were reading a new text, they would design a series of questions using three different steps.

19In the first step, students create questions about how the information in the text connects to their own life.

20In the third step, students create questions about abstract ideas, ideas that came up in the questions about themselves.

21If students follow these three steps, they have not only practiced creative ways to ask questions, they have also started practicing critical thinking.

22Meyer gave an example of what this activity could look like.

23In the activity, students read part of a story.

24In this case, the story is about how different foods affect a person.

25In the first column, there are questions about information in the text.

26One example of a question is this.

27How can food help a person's performance?

28In the second column, there are questions about how the information in the story connects to students' lives.

29For example, how do I feel and act when I don't eat well?

30In the third column, there are questions about abstract ideas that build on questions in the second column.

31The question, even though people know some foods are unhealthy, why do they eat them, is one example.

32These questions, and other questions listed in the table, are examples of how to develop questions.

33You should, of course, create your own questions.

34Meyer says that when teachers tell students which questions to answer, students are less likely to be creative about the types of questions that they ask.

35So, practice developing your own questions.

36Try making a list of questions that go from concrete to abstract, like the steps outlined above.

37Check with your teacher to make sure that your grammar is correct, and try to practice in the classroom.

38You can also write us your questions about this story in the comments section, or on our Facebook page.

39Give question asking a try, and let us know how it works for you.

40I'm John Russell.

41I'm John Russell.

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48I'm John Russell.