Questioning

Questioning is an essential aspect to learning. We are told almost every day to use metacognition with our students to ensure their complete understanding to a subject. These questions can be class discussions or silent questioning to themselves. A lot of teachers ask students if they have any questions orally as a class discussion. This can be both good and bad. The good part about asking and answering questions in whole-group discussion is that many students may have the same question, and this way, the teacher can answer them for everyone rather than having them wonder or ask individually. A reason why answering and asking questions orally may not be as effective is that students may be too shy to ask a question, so rather than asking they may just decide to figure it out on their own.

Questioning is also very effective when students ask themselves silently, especially while reading. When students are able to question text while reading, it gives them a purpose for finishing and comprehending that text in order to find out the answer. Questioning texts can also lead to researching other texts to find an answer. This gives students multiple opportunities to learn and seek out more information regarding a subject. Questioning does not come natural to all students, however, and teachers must be prepared to teach their students exactly how to question internally while reading.

Last year, I had the opportunity to teach about a comprehension strategy that this chapter talks about a great deal. ReQuest is a comprehension strategy in which higher-level thinking questions are exchanged between both students and teachers. This is an excellent way to get students more involved in questioning, feel more comfortable with questioning out loud, and allowing the teacher to model to the students exactly what type of questions they should be asking themselves while reading. I will definitely be using this and other strategies to encourage my students to question while reading. I do have a few questions though: Questioning is a hard concept to grasp at first, is there a grade where questioning instruction should begin? and what are some non-verbal ways that more shy students can practice questioning and still be assessed?

Note-taking and Note-making

Prior to reading Chapter 7, I had never distinguished between note-taking and note-making. According to this chapter, note-taking occurs when students take notes from an oral source such as a lecture or movie. Note-making, however, occurs when students make notes from a written source. These differ because in note-taking, students usually only have one chance to get the information whereas in note-making, students can usually go back to the written source as often as needed. I definitely agree with this chapter in the fact that note-taking and note-making serve such a vital role in education, but are rarely "taught." Throughout Chapter 7, a variety of different note-taking and note-making options, as well as how to teach them, are described.
One of the methods I particularly liked was the one they suggested using in social studies. In this method, there are headings and subheadings, with bullet points and lists in order to organize all information together per chapter. I really like this idea because it organizes subpoints under a larger point that all has to do with the overall point. It makes finding information in notes easier, as well as the aesthetic appeal of it being so clean and to the point. I am very Type A in the fact that I like things to be very organized and put together. I do not like having notes in my margins or out of order. Because of this, I also agree with the book when it said that teachers should also organize their lectures to be easy to follow and take notes on. When I have to squeeze more notes into a subheading because a teacher flip flopped back to a previous subject, I get a little anxiety. I enjoy a well organized lecture, that transposes into well organized notes.
One of the methods I did not particularly like was the dictoglos method used in language arts. This method seems to take a great deal of time that is just not found in the average school day. I also find it unnecessary to have students believe they need to recreate their notes to be verbatim to what the teacher has said. This can cause anxiety to over-achievers, such as myself, and have students believe that making small, bulleted notes is not enough. Although I can see where this can help students pay attention to detail and block out distractions, I think it could backfire in the future.
I agree completely that note-taking and note-making should be taught in school, but I do have a few questions. One has to do with differentiated learning. As we can see through all of the blogs that will be posted, every student has their opinion as to what "good" note-taking is. How can note-taking be taught in a way that every student can benefit? and When should note-taking begin being taught?