In Practice

Tips and Tricks

Introducing interactivity

The art of questioning

• A technique for introducing interactivity is to question students.
  • Invite answers don’t demand them
    • "Could you give us some reasons for your view?"
• Ask questions one at a time:
  • If you get no response, rephrase the question
• Avoid leading questions:
  • "Why can’t we use the chi-square test here?"
• Choose your type of question carefully:
• • Factual or exploratory questions; Relational or comparative questions
• Give students plenty of time to answer
• Show that you value all answers
• Encourage students to take more responsibility for asking questions of you:
  • Ask them "What are your questions?"

Activities

• Inviting students to express an opinion or provide an answer to the person sitting next to them
• Giving students a problem to be solved with 2 or more students around them
• Getting students to work independently on a task
• Providing students with worksheets to be filled out (independently, in pairs or groups).