In the article Education Through Play: An Approach that Fosters Engagement and Discovery in Children, we briefly discussed the notion of creating learning opportunities through reflection in play situations. Questioning and reflecting are two essential components of education that help students develop skills such as critical thinking, problem solving, and communication. For that reason, we decided to devote a blog post to them!
Questioning throughout learning situations
Teaching and learning situations typically involve three phases: preparation, execution, and assimilation. Questioning and reflecting can be integrated into each phase to maximize learners’ engagement, namely by activating prior knowledge in the preparation phase, providing coaching and feedback during the execution phase, and discussing what was learned in the assimilation phase.
Here are a few suggestions to make your questioning and analysis periods more fruitful:
- Ask open-ended questions.
- Prepare questions that are related to the objective of the teaching or learning situation.
- Don’t give away the answers too quickly. Putting a question on the back burner and circling back to it later can be a winning strategy that helps students make connections between theory and practice, or deepen their understanding of the concepts at hand.
- Devote 10–15% of the session to assimilation.
You can also use the tools offered by Lü to organize your questioning and reflection periods.
Vöte, our exit slip application, allows students to provide a short answer to a given question.
It can be used to check students’ understanding of the subject matter, to assess their level of engagement, or to summarize the important takeaways of the class.The students’ answers can help guide the assimilation phase of the learning situation.
Think-Pair-Share
Another teaching strategy that is relevant for physical education and other school subjects alike is the Think-Pair-Share strategy. Teachers start by asking a question and letting the students think about it for a few minutes. Then, students team up in pairs to discuss it. Finally, they share their team’s conclusions with the rest of the group.
This kind of approach helps students understand better while keeping an open mind to other points of view. As a result, this strategy not only contributes to the mastery of key subject matter concepts, but also allows students to work on their cognitive, social, and language skills.
Obviously, for the Think-Pair-Share strategy to work well, teachers must first determine the activity’s learning objectives in order to ask relevant leading questions. Students must also be taught how to communicate clearly and support their ideas with examples.
To help you integrate this approach in your classroom, we’ve created innovative timed (Roütine) and untimed (Wörlds) content to meet your needs and those of your students.
Teaching Games for Understanding
A number of approaches and strategies centered on student questioning have been put forward in physical education. Among these is the Teaching Games for Understanding (TGfU) approach, which favors tactical analysis over pure performance, making it easier to apply what is learned to other situations. The approach encourages teachers to focus on problem-solving strategies and guided discovery.
The lesson structure includes more questioning in the learning process, meaning that rather than waiting until the end of the teaching period to carry out the assimilation phase, games are interrupted by periods of questioning and reflection with the students. Students are regularly asked to reflect on their actions, analyze the game, and improve their decision-making.
Lü utilities can help you organize your discussion and reflection periods effectively following a TGfU approach.
Try the Lümi application to vary between cooperative and competitive play. For example, using an implement with blue lighting, have two students pass a ball between them. Then change the lighting to red, and have students switch from cooperation to competition mode. After the game, discuss the differences in strategies between the two modes of play with the students.
In conclusion, having students ask questions and reflect is a powerful tool that can be harnessed by physical education teachers. Doing so can help students develop a better understanding of the concepts being taught and grow in other aspects as well, perfecting their critical thinking, problem-solving, and communication skills. Of course, you can count on Lü’s innovative system as an ally for implementing this type of approach with your students!
