How can we grow a culture of questioning and curiosity with our students?
Research indicates that effective learners ask questions. We want children to be curious and approach life with ‘wonderment and awe’. Questions help children discover and uncover new meanings. They are the bridge that takes us from the unknown to the new.
When young children are left to explore the world, questions naturally arise out of life experience; indeed, some of the most profound questions we hear come from the ‘mouths of babes’. Sadly, children’s questions rapidly decrease as they enter and continue schooling.
We want our students to be questioning – to be curious, risk taking, wondering learners who are thirsty to examine, critique and explore the world.
What can we do to encourage this as parents and as a School?
How do we build the ability of students to ask a range of questions to assist them to learn more about the world and themselves as learners?
And how can we manage questions effectively when they are raised?
This requires a team approach from the School community. Teachers and parents alike can model a curious disposition every day. We can value and work with children’s questions and build their questioning skills and knowledge. We can also plan learning experiences around questions. Perhaps the most powerful thing we can do is to be more aware of our questioning as we talk with our children.
‘If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children, I would ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life.’ (Rachel Carson, 1965)
Roderick Wood
Associate Principal of Primary