The author of Deconstructing Depth of Knowledge: A Method and Model for Deeper Teaching and Learning, Erik Francis, joins Steve to examine what teaching and learning for depth of knowledge (DOK) looks like. Francis describes ways to support staff with ways to use DOK for differentiating based on the demands of standards and building upon the strengths and successes of students.

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Podcast Transcript:

[00:00:00.300] – Steve [Intro]

Welcome to the Steve Barkley Ponders Out Loud podcast. As instructional coaches and school leaders, you are tasked with guiding continuous teacher growth to create student success. This podcast looks to support you with strategies from experienced guests, as well as my own insights that I’ve gathered over the years. I’m thrilled to have you with us. Thanks for tuning in.

[00:00:29.990] – Steve

Exploring depth of knowledge, teaching and learning. Joining our podcast today is Erik Francis, an international author and presenter who specializes in providing guidance, support, and training to educators on how to develop rigorous learning environments. He explores educational experiences that engage and encourage students to demonstrate different levels of thinking and understand and use their depth of knowledge through inquiry by questioning with good questions. Erik has been a classroom teacher, a site administrator, an education program specialist with a state agency, and a staff development trainer. Through his company, Maverik Education, Erik has led and facilitated in-person and virtual professional development trainings at K-12 schools, colleges, and universities throughout the United States and internationally. Erik is the author of “Inquiring Minds to Want to Learn: Posing Good Questions to Promote Student Inquiry” and “Deconstructing Depth of Knowledge: A Method and Model for Deeper Teaching and Learning.”

[00:01:45.320] – Steve

I’ve asked Erik today to take us on a deeper look at understanding depth of knowledge. Welcome, Erik.

[00:01:53.890] – Erik

Thank you, Steve, for having me, and thank you for inviting me on your podcast to share on this forum.

[00:02:00.600] – Steve

Terrific. I’m really looking forward to our conversation. I’m wondering if you could just start us off with a general description of what it means to learn at a greater depth.

[00:02:12.630] – Erik

That’s a really great question because there’s a lot of confusion and misinformation, miscommunication about what depth means. You can have deeper levels of thinking, which is usually categorized in a cognitive framework like Bloom’s Revise Taxonomy or the solo taxonomy or Marzano’s taxonomy of educational objectives. And those taxonomies categorize the complexity of the type and level of thinking students can demonstrate. The hard part about that, the challenging part about that is, what does that look like, sound like, and feel like? What does that look like to think deeply? What does that sound like to think deeply? What does that feel like to think deeply?  When I talk about depth, I say that depth is communicative and depth is contextual. I have a statement, I say that the rigor is in the response. When I am learning deeply, it depends upon what exactly do I have to learn and how deeply do I have to comprehend and communicate my learning. If I just have to give you an answer, that’s a very, very simple level because there’s only one way to get that correct answer. Also, the answer is either going to be correct or incorrect.

[00:03:31.930] – Erik

The deeper levels would be the deeper levels of communication, the more extensive communication. If I had to explain and express with examples how I attained an answer, or justify or verify why the answer is accurate or appropriate with evidence or consider, conclude, or critique based upon evidence. That’s a deeper level. If I have to explore and extend for an extended purpose or an extended period, that’s a deeper level. So when I talk about greater depth, I don’t look at it so much as the cognition. There are deeper levels of cognition, and unfortunately, we categorize them as higher levels and lower levels, which often gets misinterpreted as, these are what we want and these are what we need to avoid. But when we talk about depth, it’s more about communication and contextual. What exactly do students have to think about or learn and how deeply do students have to comprehend and communicate the depth and extent of their learning?

[00:04:34.100] – Steve

I put a question here, and it’s going through my mind now, tying it back to reading some of the things on your website. I was going to ask you to talk about the concepts of applying DOK in teaching and learning. And what I’m recalling from being on your website and just listening to the response you gave, there’s an understanding of the teacher knowing the depth of knowledge that they’re seeking, but also the student knowing it. Have I got that right?

[00:05:07.600] – Erik

You do. You’re on the right track. You are right with it. The teacher needs to know the level of depth of knowledge demanded and that is basically driven by the standards. So what I like to say is delivery intensity of a DOK teaching and learning experience, a depth of knowledge teaching and learning experience, depends upon two things: the demand of the standard and the the students. The teacher needs to know what exactly and how deeply that standard that they are addressing and assessing in a given grade level in a specific subject with certain content demands students to comprehend and communicate their learning. They need to look at the standard like the finish line in a race. This is what all kids need to reach and all kids need to cross. We need to believe that all kids can reach the finish line and cross the finish line. It may not be in the way that we understand or how to teach, or it also may not be in the time frame we have to teach them. But we need to believe that the kids can do that. When I talk about the strengths of the student, that’s where the DOK are levels because they’re not a taxonomy.

[00:06:17.920] – Erik

They don’t scaffold. Each DOK level describes one of four different ways kids can engage with their learning. So at a DOK one, all they have to do is answer, correctly or incorrectly. That’s it. At a DOK 2, they have to establish and explain or express and explain with examples. At a DOK 3, they either have to justify or verify with evidence or consider concluding critique based on evidence. At a DOK 4, they have to explore and extend with examples and evidence for an extended period, which means more than one class period, more than one day, more than one week, more than even month or even a quarter. And the standard sets that. But then we need to look at it using understanding by design, begin with the end in mind. This is the finish line. Where are you on that pathway to proficiency? So if I have a DOK 2 standard, I need to know where they are on that pathway to proficiency and identify their strengths and build upon their strengths so that they can rise to reach and go beyond the DOK level. That’s how I turn the DOK levels into a multi-tiered system of support or an RTI, where you start with the standard.

[00:07:40.030] – Erik

Your tier one is teaching grade level to the standard. Your tier two is the extended time you have, give the students who are struggling to achieve the standard at the grade level, maybe the foundational learning. And tier three is you may have to go to not only reduce DOK levels, but also reduce grade levels to find out where are they in their learning? For example, I just came back from a school and I was talking to them about their fifth graders who took an assessment, and they said the results of the assessment said they’re reading at a second grade level. Well, what does that mean? What does it mean to read at a second grade level? I have to look at those standards and see what it means to read at a second grade level or do math at a second grade level. Because I can’t just say they’re reading at a second grade level. Well, what does that mean? And that’s what DOK does. It gives not only clarity, but also concrete measures and concrete communication of what exactly and how deeply students must understand and use their learning or comprehend and communicate their learning.

[00:08:50.300] – Steve

As I was hearing you lay that out, it struck me that, and I guess you hit on this now, you’ve mentioned the teachers need to know the levels before them, but I’m guessing they need to know the levels above them as to that hitting that appropriate level with their student so that it strikes me, especially secondary, that I have an understanding in that next science-level course, what is it that the student needs to be able… The depth they had to go here in order to be successful there.

[00:09:29.600] – Erik

Correct. You need to know what the pathway to proficiency is. You need to basically know, how am I tiering my instruction? What do I need to do? What do the kids need to do to basically achieve that standard? Because that’s what DOK is all about. DOK starts with the standard. It originated with the standards. Norman Webb, when he created depth of Knowledge, he never created this to be a method of model for teaching and learning. It was a criterion for alignment studies. And the four levels were not a taxonomy. They were a rating scale. You would look at your standard’s learning expectation, and you would see whether it’s a one, two, three, or four based upon that criteria. And then you would look at your activities and assessments that address that standard, and you would code them a one, two, three, or four, and you would see how closely they match up with each other to see the degree of alignment. That’s what originally was developed. When we went Common Core, they took the work of Karen Hess, who made it a measure cognitive rigor. What she did was she said the cognitive rigor of a learning expectation depends upon the level of thinking students must demonstrate, as indicated by a cognitive framework, she used Bloom’s, and the level of depth of knowledge demanded, according to Webb.

[00:10:47.090] – Erik

So she superimposed it. But again, it was more so categorical to say, what’s the right level of rigor? I look at my verb and I say, this is where it is in Bloom’s. And I’d code it for it to analyze, I’d code it as Bloom’s four because that’s the level is out of six. And then I would see maybe that all they have to do is analyze whether the information is in the text. Okay, well, they’re either going to answer yes or no. That makes it a DOK 1. The coding of rigor would be blooms 4 – DOK 1. If it said analyze how the information is present in a text, now it’s a DOK 2 because they have to explain how the information is used. Now it’s a Bloom’s 4 DOK 2. If it said analyze how the information supports the central idea or theme of a text, now it’s a level 3 because I have to justify or verify. So I’m now at a Bloom’s 4 DOK 3. So that’s how that works. What I did with it, because a lot of people were using it as a method of model for teaching and learning. If you do a great deep dive into all the frameworks, the people who created them always tell you, Well, that’s not I intended it to be.

[00:12:01.230] – Erik

I had a great conversation a couple of months ago with Dr. Tom Gusky, where he was explaining to me how Bloom’s taxonomy is widely used, but often misused. I once had a conversation with Jay McTie, who told me that the six facets of understanding he developed with Grant Wiggins, they don’t scaffold, but we get these interpretations out there. So what I did with it is that I turned it into a method and model for teaching and learning by saying, using it and turning it into an MTSS or RTI. You start with the standard, you tier where the students are, and you build upon their strengths so they can rise to reach and go beyond that bar. That basically does two things. First of all, for the teacher, they don’t feel like they have to start at a level one to get to a level three. They don’t. You begin with the end in mind and you use it diagnostically to assess where the students are in relation to that standard. For the student, the student understands what they need to do so they can rise to reach and go beyond that standard. It’s not about what they can’t do, but what they can do at that level successfully and how they can get to the level of the standard.

[00:13:18.800] – Erik

Lately, because you write a book in 2022 and you learn so much from your experiences that you grow and develop, what I’ve been talking about with DOK is that I’ve said, I’ve turned DOK into a concept in which you have to ask what exactly and how deeply do the students have to comprehend and communicate their learning? You go through the great Larry Gainsworth method of unpacking standards, circle your verbs, underline your nouns. Now you know the skills and the key concept and content, or I like to say the skills and stuff. Then you take a highlighter and you highlight all the words that follow that first verb of an objective. Everything in the yellow is what describes in details what exactly and how deeply students must understand and use their learning. And you use the okay as a language to say, okay, so if the standard demands that, what does that look like, sound like, and feel like? How do I know they can do that? Well, if all they have to do is answer, that’s a DOK one. And it’s not you getting bogged down saying, well, first they have to do this, then they have to do this.

[00:14:26.190] – Erik

No, that’s the step to completion. We need to show the visible learning. That’s what I did with DOK, made the learning visible. If they have to explain or express with examples, it’s a level two. If they have to justify or verify with evidence or conclude, consider a critique based on evidence, evidence is key there. That’s a DOK three. If they’re exploring and extending for an extended purpose, not just doing a project-based learning or a project, is it purposeful? Is there some purpose behind this? It’s not just seeing what the difference in the water levels are in where you live. It’s measuring and comparing the difference in water levels over the years to come up with a plan for water conservation. That’s a DOK 4. They can take an extended amount of time, but time is a characteristic, not a criteria. That’s what I mean by simplifying. I know I over-explain it, but in a nutshell, what if we can simplify the learning to say, We want our kids to comprehend and communicate their learning in four ways. We either want them to answer correctly or incorrectly. That’s a DOK one.

[00:15:42.330] – Erik

We want them to explain with examples or express their opinion with examples to support it. That’s a DOK 2. Justify or verify some response, result, or reasoning, be it their own or someone else’s. That’s a DOK 3. Or conclude, consider critique based on evidence, that’s also a level three, or explore and extend for an extended purpose in over extended period. That’s a level four. It’s not, what do they do today? It’s, how do I know that they’re learning it? And what can I get them to do to even communicate deeply or more extensively to really show me that they got it?

[00:16:24.990] – Steve

If I took those four that you just walked me through, and I’m a school administrator administrator or an instructional coach, spending time in the classroom watching the students and focus on what students are doing would give me an understanding of where they are in-depth of knowledge, or at least where they’re working, what depth of knowledge they’re working on. They may not be there yet, but they’re working on it.

[00:16:56.820] – Erik

Exactly. So here’s what I like to say, because I really I am really sensitive about how teachers see this and take this. I want teachers to know, depth of knowledge is not about the complexity and quality of your teaching. I want all teachers to know that you are teaching at deeper DOK levels. I even say to teachers, look, you’re teaching at deeper DOK levels, to which sometimes administrators look at me and go, Erik, what did you just tell my teachers? Think about it. I’m explaining and expressing at a DOK 2, and what am I doing when I’m teaching? Instructing. I’m basically doing that. So I’m teaching at a DOK 2. I’m justifying and verifying whether my answers are accurate, whether the kids are accurate. That’s a DOK 3. I’m considering different ways to teach it. That’s a DOK 3. Or considering what I could ask them, critiquing through evaluation and concluding based upon how the students are doing, whether they’re getting it or not. That’s a DOK 3. I’m also as a teacher, and teachers are great about this, where you can make connections between your standards, your curriculum, and the real world, and your students’ lives. That’s a DOK 4.

[00:18:06.150] – Erik

So everybody is teaching at deeper DOK levels beyond a DLK 1. The question is, what’s the level your kids are learning at? When I walk in a room, I’m not looking at the teacher, I’m looking at the kids. If I just see kids taking it in and just acquiring that knowledge and answering questions that they answer correctly or incorrectly, and a teacher is doing most of the talking, that’s a DOK 1. I like to say a DOK 1 is like if your classroom runs a quiz show – it’s Jeopardy or who wants to be a millionaire. Because if you think about it, who’s the star of those shows? It’s the host. The participants, they’re not the stars. Flip that, the teacher’s the star of a show at a DOK 1, and the students or the consultants are either going to answer correctly or incorrectly. At a DOK 2, now the students are explaining how they attain their answers, or they’re explaining how they address the problem or accomplish their tasks, or they’re explaining the ideas and information, how it’s presented in a text or pertaining to a topic. The student is now the star of the show.

[00:19:16.850] – Erik

So I like to say a DOK 2 for a student, now they have their own do it yourself television show. They are Bob Ross on the Joy of Painting. They are 30 Minute Meals with Rachel Ray. They’re telling you how to cook. But they’re the star. The teacher is the one who goes “and action,” and now the kids are at the start. The teacher is more of a guide on it. At a DOK 3, the simplest way to do a DOK 3 is to give the kids an answer, an outcome or a goal and ask them how they could accomplish it within a given time frame. So what I used to do when I used to teach math is I used to basically give the kids the answer key for their test. And the kids would say, “Mr. Francis, you gave us the answer key.” I go, “Right. You have to tell me why those answers are all correct.” Or I don’t say, “what’s the central idea or theme of the story?” I give them the idea it addresses, and we discuss that idea, and then we go back to the text and I ask them, how does the text address this idea?

[00:20:21.790] – Erik

They come up with the central idea statement or the thematic statement and give me evidence from the text. That not only teaches them them how to do evidentiary level thinking, but from a test prep standpoint, that prepares them for what they’re going to have, because here’s what happens. You get the passage. Question number one, what’s the central idea of this passage? You have four options. I call it the Vegas question because you got one out of four chances to get it correct. Most likely you’ll circle what is familiar to you, not so much what the central idea. It’s like, okay, I understand that. The ones that the kids all get incorrect for the most part is which part of the text supports the central idea and theme. You’re actually teaching them at that deeper level. The easiest way to teach it a DOK 2 is every time a student gives you an answer, you ask “you’re right, but why?” if they’re correct. And if they’re incorrect or you need further clarification, you ask them, “what do you mean?” So this will go away from the single statement answer. So if I asked you, what is two plus two?

[00:21:29.980] – Erik

You would say…

[00:21:31.260] – Steve

Four, hopefully.

[00:21:32.290] – Erik

And I’d say, hey, you’re right, but why?

[00:21:34.370] – Steve

Why. Got you.

[00:21:35.540] – Erik

Because that’s the transferable learning. Now, DOK 4 is more of an extensive experience. DOK 3, what I like to say is skills-based TV reality shows like Lego Masters or Top Chef. On Lego Masters, you have to build a landscape. Here’s your Legos. You got 30 minutes. How could you do it? Top Chef, you have to make a taco bar. Here’s your ingredients. What taco bar can you create? You got 30 minutes. I also say it’s like panel discussions. If you’re watching NFL Sunday on Fox, or if you’re watching Meet the Press, where you’re moderating, you’re having a Socratic discussion. DOK 4 is an extensive experience where the student develops their expertise. And that’s where they have to go either address a wicked problem or basically create an impossible project. And they can’t solve the problem. They can only address it, handle it, resolve it, settle it, or walk away from it. And it’s extensive in that point. So what I like to say is that those are more shows like Kitchen Nightmare with Gordon Ramsey. He’s the expert who comes in. Can he salvage this restaurant, this failing restaurant? Yes, no, maybe so. It’s The Apprentice with Martha Stewart.

[00:22:49.340] – Erik

I make sure I make that clear. Where people come together, they have to come up with a task, they have to complete the task, and they have to do this for an extended period for an extended purpose. Or it’s Shark Tank, where you do something innovative with it. So that’s basically when you’re going into classrooms and when I do DOK walk-through observations, which I’m doing with a lot of instructional coaches and instructional leaders, I tell them, I don’t want you to look at the teacher. I want you to look at the kids.

[00:23:17.760] – Steve

I’m just wondering, as we start to wrap up here, what supports do teachers need from school leaders to build greater depth into student learning?

[00:23:31.270] – Erik

Well, it’s interesting you say that, because one of the things I found is that when you invite me in to talk about DOK for 2-6 hours, that doesn’t work. It doesn’t work not only for the time period that we have, but there’s also the human resources. I discovered a theory out there. It’s called the Diffusions of Innovation, and it’s how you make changes. It’s by a man named Everett Rogers. What’s really interesting is that people use this to chart how make social changes. Marketers do this to see how they make a product go saturate into the community or change agents and technology. It breaks down like this. You have your innovators, and they’re wild about PD. They love it. These are the people in the real world, they sleep out for Apple iPhone, even though they can get them a few weeks later. Or they sleep out because they got to see that Star Wars showing, the first showing. In education, these are the people who are wild about professional development, but that’s 2.5% of your population. The other is what he calls early adopters. These are the people who are willing and wanting to lead and learn.

[00:24:41.550] – Erik

These are the people who should receive the training. But it’s not that I’m an instructional leader, I’m a principal. It’s, are you willing and wanting to listen, lead, and learn with this initiative? Because those people are going to basically be the ones who make it diffuse it through your school. I like to call them, based upon Malcolm Gladwell’s work, they’re the mavens, where I’m turning them into the ones with expertise. They’re the champions in that they believe in this, and they believe it works. And they’re also the connectors because they’re the ones who have to, what they call cross the chasm, which goes from the people who love professional development and the people willing and wanting to listen and learn to what they call early majority, which is 34% of your population who says, why do I need to do this? And after you train those people to be your instructional leaders and your instructional coaches, the mavens, the connectors, champions, they’re the ones who connect them with the group with the early adopters. So they come back and say, hey, they’re saying, why do I need to learn this? And we work together as a group to do it.

[00:25:55.030] – Erik

And then we come back and we basically convince them and address their concerns. Then you have the other % of your population, which is also 34%, and they call that late majority. And late majority are passive aggressive. They say, This too shall pass, and I’ll just wait this out. And if I I have to do it, I’ll do it. Reluctantly, but I’ll do it. When you get this and the support that you need is, you need to find that staff who can lead it and basically connect with the early majority. Get them on board. So late majority says, hey, what’s going on over there? That looks interesting. Now, are you telling me this works? Because then what’s going to happen is they’re going to either get on board or they’re going to come a part of what we call the 16% which I like to call as late mass. There’s a term for it. The actual term is laggards. I don’t think that’s very polite, but I like to call it late mass. These are the people, they say one thing, nope, not going to do it. Now, they don’t just do it out of defiance.

[00:27:01.740] – Erik

Sometimes they do it out of fear, sometimes they do it out of insecurity, sometimes they do it out of a response to change. When I talk with the instructional leaders and the administrators, what they need to do, they’re the ones who need to basically have the conversation. What Jennifer Abram says, hard conversations. They’re the ones who have the hard conversation. They need to go, the school leaders, the one who are the administrators, need to say, why are you hesitant to do this? Or why are you reluctant to do this? If they say, I’m concerned, I don’t know about this, you tell them, we have people who will guide and support you with this coaching. We understand that. If they say, I don’t want to do it, or they give you a reason, I don’t feel like I need to do it, well, maybe they don’t because they’re doing well, so you have to find out how you can basically connect with them. Or if it’s a defiance thing, then you have to say, look, maybe this is the direction we’re going. This may not be the place for you anymore. And that’s okay. Hey, but this is the direction we’re going.

[00:28:03.590] – Erik

And this is what the kids need. So I’m going to give you a choice. You can take the help or you can say, You know what? This is not for me. And I will accept both. But here’s what I won’t accept. You can’t refuse it, and you can’t refute it. Because the late mass, though they’re only 16%, they’re allowed 16%. They’re the ones who are going to basically speak up, speak out, and oftentimes not speak politely, and oftentimes make it more personal than professional. That groundwork, that needs to be set. That needs to be the groundwork, is that if this is the direction the school is going. You can’t get everybody on board, but what can you do to convince people, to basically show people, to help people understand and help people realize that they can do this and it will hopefully benefit them and bring them as a part of it. Or if they don’t want to be a part of it, then that’s a whole different conversation. That’s the support we need to have. We need to basically have it where we can’t just go, okay, boom, here’s DOKP. Who are the people who are willing and wanting to listen, lead, and learn?

[00:29:20.260] – Erik

The innovators, but they’re scary because they’re like, oh, this is wonderful. This is great. Like, whoa, hang on there. Slow down. The people who know how to connect with the early majority who says, why do I need to do this? And that’s a great question. Focus on them. The late majority comes aboard because they get curious, and they’re either going to become early majority or they’re going to become late mass, and you need to have that hard conversation.

[00:29:46.730] – Steve

I had it described years ago as… Really what I’m hearing is you need a plan.

[00:29:52.740] – Erik

Yes.

[00:29:53.860] – Steve

Okay. And I heard it described by a superintendent as invitational to expectational. So over time, what we’re doing here, it’s going to start out invitational. That’s working with the folks that you described on the early end.

[00:30:13.650] – Erik

What you also said is over time. We can’t do these one-and-dones. I mean, would you expect a student to be able to do physics, chemistry, and calculus in two hours and become not only proficient, but masters of it? No. Then what Why do we expect this of teachers? On the flip side of it, we always need to improve our craft. We always need to enhance our instructional talents. So that’s why we have professional development. I can’t tell you how many times, I even just heard it this past week that the principal said that I told the teachers, you’re coming  Erik and the teacher said, well, what am I doing wrong? Well, wait a minute. It’s not that you’re doing anything wrong. It’s that you’re doing well, but this is going to enhance it. That’s the thing is that it’s not how many kids are proficient, it’s how many kids who didn’t get proficient. Why? I mean, I had high proficiency rates, and I’m blessed for that, and I’m fortunate and lucky, but I didn’t sit on my laurels and go, Okay, great. I got 80% proficiency. I got 85% proficiency. And of that, a smaller % of mastery.

[00:31:29.440] – Erik

But I got 15 to 20% who are not. What happened?

[00:31:34.590] – Steve

Bingo.

[00:31:35.270] – Erik

I get scared about that when you get the letter grades because we have a lot of schools right now who, because of cut scores, they have kids who they have 60% proficiency, and they’re getting A’s for their school. And they got it for growth, great, maybe, but you still have 40% who are not proficient.

[00:31:57.020] – Steve

I just worked with one of those schools with 80%, and people are feeling good about it when they look around the other schools in the neighborhood that aren’t hitting 80. Instead of shining the light and asking the question, who are these 20 and what does that mean to us?

[00:32:18.470] – Erik

Right. And see, that’s the thing. Simon Sinek writes about this. He calls it the infinite game. I don’t agree what he says in there about education because he says education is a finite game, which means that there’s a goal and an an end. Like, sports have an end. You got to win the game. You got to get to the Super Bowl. You got to get to the Championship. The infinite game is, here’s what it is now, but I need to keep on looking to the next, the future. Right now, I’m on top, but that’s today. What could happen tomorrow? Where do I go from here? You hear that with schools. They go, oh, we got growth and we got this letter grade. Okay, great. What are you going to do for the next step? Because now, can you grow? Because you’re not going to get that point. Because if you stay at the same level in growth, you’re not going to get that point. And that’s why schools go from, how do I go from A to a C? So we need to always say, we got that letter grade. Great.

[00:33:16.680] – Erik

It was a great season. We won the Super Bowl. Fantastic. Now we’re in a new season. Are we going to get to the Super Bowl? There’s no guarantees of that. And I’ve even had a way of work with teachers, and And not a criticism, but they say, these are my scores last year, and I got this many proficient. Well, this year, I’m not this many proficient, so it must be the kids. Well, no, no, wait a minute. And what’s even better is that that person moved up with their kids. So what they had in the last grade is the same kids. So you got the same team. So I had to make the analogy. I said, and this was back in the day, I said, who won the Super Bowl last year? And they go, The Los Angeles Rams. And I said, and Did the Rams win the Super Bowl this year? No. Okay, but you still got the same team. It’s not what you did last season. It’s what you’re doing now. And that’s the thing. If you want to celebrate the A, that’s great. But you got to keep that eye on the prize, that you’re always growing, that we did great last year.

[00:34:22.910] – Erik

It was a great year. What’s happening? You got 40% of your kids not proficient, according to that assessment. Why? What happened on those days? And it may not be that they didn’t know it. Maybe it’s that the assessment wasn’t aligned to how you were instructing. Maybe that was a week somebody found out their parents were getting divorced or they didn’t feel well. And also now you’re going into this year with 40%, but the 60 % you’re going in with that’s proficient, that’s what they were back in April, when you basically intensified the last three weeks to prepare them for that test, that’s where they were based on an assessment taken in April. Okay, now we’ve gone from April, May, June, July – four months. A lot can happen in four months. You got the summer slide or learning loss or something happened to that child over the summer, social and emotionally, that maybe poof, it went out of their head that there’s things on their life. Or maybe last year was just not a good year for them. So what I like to say is, and as you go back, what supports do teachers need from school leaders?

[00:35:40.690] – Erik

I like to say we go in with the idea that no one is at grade level when they get to you. No one. Now, give to teachers like to say, Well, some kids are above grade level. I go, Right. No one’s at grade level. What is grade level? The standard. This is what it means to demonstrate proficiency in this grade level in this specific subject with this certain content. You don’t have to like it, but this is the measure. This is basically our finish line. Now, where are you on that track to proficiency, on that pathway to proficiency? When I tell teachers, I say, what do you teach? They go, Fifth grade. I said, well, were your kids fifth graders last year? They go, no. I go, then they’re not fifth graders. They’re not grade level. They’re fourth graders coming from fourth grade, and they were whatever they were based on a test they took in April or something happened over the summer. Start with the end in mind, understanding by design. Go do that. Start with the end of mind. Diagnose where they are in a track. You don’t have to go on your market set, go to get to the finish line.

[00:36:46.460] – Erik

They’re not racing. You’re training them. You’re coaching them. This is the race. Finish lines are defined by their races. I like to say with DOK, a DOK 1 is like a dash. Get to the finish line. A DOK 2 is an obstacle course and a blow up on your backyard because now you got to apply your skills and you got to use that information to get to it. A DOK 3 is an American Ninja course because now you got to think strategically, how do I get to that finish line? A DOK 4 is a triathlon because now not only am I running, but I’m also bringing in swimming and biking. What I do is I flip it horizontally and I say to people, which is the better race? They said, nothing’s better. It’s just a different expectation. I said, that’s the DLK levels. Don’t think of a four as better than a one, because if the standard just demands the kids to do a dash and you’re teaching them to do a triathlon, great, but they’re not hitting the standard.

[00:37:50.100] – Steve

Well, Eric, you pushed my depth of knowledge a lot, and I appreciate it. What’s the best way that listeners might follow up with you, find your book, books about the work you’re doing?

[00:38:02.660] – Erik

Well, my books are published by SolutionTree. So if you go to solutiontree.com, that’s where you’ll find the books. The specific URL address is for the depth of knowledge, it’s solutiontree.com/truedok. And for “Inquiring Minds Want to Learn,” which is the questioning, it is solutiontree.com/inquiringminds. I also have a website. It’s www.maverik.com, there’s no C in Maverick and no C in my name. M-a-v-e-r-i-k. Company is actually to play on my name, but it’s also my daughter’s names are Madison, Avery, and Amanda. I’m also a child of the ’80s, so you probably guess what my favorite movie is, Topgun. So no C in Maverick. If you put a C in Maverick, you’ll get Tom Cruise’s page.

[00:38:51.640] – Steve

We’ll put your website in the lead-in to the podcast, make it easy for people to check back and forth. Thank you so much.

[00:39:02.250] – Erik

Thank you. I appreciate it.

[00:39:04.790] – Steve

Thanks for listening, folks. I’d love to hear what you’re pondering. You can find me on Twitter or LinkedIn at Steve Barkley, or send me your questions and find my videos and blogs at barkleypd.com.

“Phrasing and posing a good question can be just as complex and difficult as the process of answering. It involves critical, creative, and reflective thinking from both students and educators.” (Erik Francis)

As the author of Inquiring Minds Want to Learn: Posing Good Questions to Promote Student Inquiry, Erik Francis explores strategies for how questions can set the stage for student engagement and learning. He shares the power of the questioning stems, “How do you_________? How can you _________? And How could you__________?”

Visit the Maverik Education site here.

Subscribe to the Steve Barkley Ponders Out Loud podcast on iTunes or visit BarkleyPD.com to find new episodes!

Podcast Transcript:

[00:00:00.400] – Steve [Intro]

Hello and welcome to the teacher edition of Steve Barkley Ponders Out Loud. Teaching is a complex and rewarding journey and I’m always eager to explore the many ways teachers engage students in their learning. This podcast is dedicated to supporting you, the teacher, as you inspire and guide your students. Thanks for joining me. I’m excited you’re here.

[00:00:29.800] – Steve

Posing Good Questions to Promote Student Inquiry. Listeners who have followed my work, writings and podcasts know that I could not pass up on an opportunity to have an author of books titled “Inquiring Minds Want to Learn: Posing Good Questions to Promote Student Inquiry.” And “Now That’s a Good Question: how to Promote Cognitive Rigor Through Classroom Questioning.” I just had to invite the author of those books to this podcast. Joining us today is Erik Francis, an international author and a presenter with over 25 years of experience working in education as a classroom teacher, a site administrator, an education program specialist with a state agency, and a staff development trainer. Erik produces and provides professional development and guidance to support educators. Welcome, Erik.

[00:01:30.110] – Erik

Thank you, Steve, for having me. I appreciate you inviting me on your forum to share.

[00:01:35.590] – Steve

I’m wondering, for starters, if we could talk a little bit about your teaching experiences and what led you into an interest on questioning and inquiry.

[00:01:46.540] – Erik

Well, I’m a questioner and I’m a natural questioner. I question like I’m still 2 to 5 years old because I’m always asking why and I have that curiosity, I have that inquiring mind that I like to talk about. So an inquiring mind looks at the world with questions. And what I found when I started teaching, and traditionally how you teach is it’s very top down, it’s very teacher-led. And one of the things I realized is that when we teach, we do three things. We present information, we provide instruction, and we pose questions primarily for assessment. So when I started teaching and I started realizing that I was up there doing a lot of talking and I can talk a lot and wax philosophical. And I found my kids were just sitting there staring blankly and some kids were getting in, some kids weren’t. And this was even before time, before we had smartphones, where they were living their lives by what I like to say by an MTV second, now they live their lives like by a TikTok millisecond, where you really have to capture their interest with it. And what I found is if I started asking questions and I started having the kids actively learn and actively acquire and apply and analyze and augment their learning through the questions I ask, they were actually not only learning deeper, but they were taking it with them.

[00:03:19.570] – Erik

They were not just learning for the day. It wasn’t the question that they had to address for the exit ticket out the door. It wasn’t the question they had to address that would help them pass a test at the end of the week or two weeks or even a state assessment. They took it. They made it their own. They really embraced it. If we talked about the effective domain of Bloom’s taxonomy, not only did they receive the information from addressing a question and respond to it, but they valued it. They put value what’s important, what’s not. They organized based upon what’s important, what’s not, and they characterized it by making their own. So when I ask a question and to teach my kids, because they grew up thinking if I ask a question, they have to give me an answer, they knew when I asked questions they didn’t have to answer, this was what they were going to address and I wanted them to reflect before they responded. And if they did respond quickly, I would say either one or two things: “you’re right, but why?” Because that affirms they’re correct. Or, “what do you mean?”

[00:04:30.850] – Erik

Which means that they were either incorrect, then they had to check their understanding, or they had to clarify further what they meant because maybe their response was too vague or broad or just too rote. And I want them to be able to use it. And that’s a big thing. I think that’s even a special thing right now because our kids need to learn how to communicate. We talk about science of reading, but a big part of that science of reading with literacy is communication. It’s not whether you can comprehend what you’re reading, but also can you summarize or explain your own words, what you just read? Can you use the information to justify or verify whether it’s accurate or inaccurate or your. Your reasoning is accurate or inaccurate. Will that information you use to go and explore and extend what you want to learn will create further questions. So. So that’s kind of where it is. So I’m a natural questioner. I thank my father for that. He taught me to question everything. I’m a creative person. So I always ask, what if? I always want to know why? And I just incorporated that into my teaching, and that’s what makes me a lifelong learner.

[00:05:43.540] – Steve

Would you say you caused the kids to work harder?

[00:05:46.740] – Erik

Oh, definitely. Definitely. I mean, I could walk in a room and I can just basically ask a single question and get the kids going. It even got to A point when in my classroom where the kids knew if I was going to either A, lecture or B, do inquiry with them, engage them in inquiry. Because I say inquiry is the experience and questioning is what we do to engage people in inquiry. So there’s some confusion about that. Where people think questioning is inquiry. No, it’s not. Inquiry is the experience. I mean, I can tell you to do inquiry, but questioning is how you engage people in inquiry. So I even had times where  they knew it was a lecture day because my desk were in rows and my kids would even sometimes come in and go, “Mr. Francis, can you just ask us the question and we’ll get the information back to you.” And I’m like, “sure, great.”

[00:06:34.000] – Steve

As I was listening to you, this connection just jumped into my head. Did you ever hear of studies they did that they called the IKEA effect?

[00:06:43.720] – Erik

No.

[00:06:44.500] – Steve

People went to an IKEA store and they, they built a, you know, a piece of furniture and then when they were ready to leave, they could purchase the one that they built or one that IKEA already had put together there, and people were willing to pay more money to have the one that they built to go with them. And that’s what was talking about your kids having work to figure something out, ownership and a value they put on it that superseded you giving it to them in an easier fashion.

[00:07:24.210] – Erik

Because what you’re doing is you’re creating an experience for them. Kids don’t remember stuff. What kids remember, what people remember is experiences. If we go through K-12, we go to college, you know, now It’s K-16. If we get to grad school, maybe It’s K-18, K-20 – do you remember every lesson and everything you learned, or do you remember those experiences where you really delved deep into it, that you had to not only answer, but you had to explain why, how, that you got that answer, or justify why it’s correct or incorrect, or explore and extend beyond what was assigned to you or what’s being taught to you? Those are the experiences you take to. So what I try to tell teachers is what you can use questions for assessment, of course, but you’re using the question to make it more of a student centered, student supportive learning experience, because they will remember that experience. And what you’re doing is you’re creating what I call a trigger to transfer. So when I see that problem or I see that question, or I see that skill I have to use on an assessment, you’re triggering and transferring the experience.

[00:08:38.490] – Erik

And that experience can either be pleasurable or painful because you’ll sit there and go, oh, yeah, that’s like what Mr. Francis had me do this. And that’s how you do it. Or, oh, my gosh, this reminds me of. Mr. Francis made me do this, and I did it like this. And he told me no. He asked me, you know, to really check my work. And what do I mean by that? Oh, that’s how you do it. See? So we take that, and we basically are giving them a pleasurable experience of accomplishment or sometimes we don’t want to say painful, but, you know, it’s painful as a personal thing, but giving them those opportunities of creative frustration and productive struggle. Now, don’t emphasize that I said frustration, struggle. Those are the nouns. Those are the behaviors. Look at the descriptors. Creative frustration is working through something, you know, thinking creatively and trying to figure out how you can make that concrete. Productive struggle is, I’m struggling with this. Hey, this way is not working. Well, what if I do it this way? What if I do it that way? See how I’m engaging in inquiry? But I can’t just do it.

[00:09:45.740] – Erik

If I just show you how to do it and say, “do inquiry,” or “come up with a bunch of questions.” And say, “okay, hey, they’re great. Making questions.” Or, hey,  they’re asking, addressing their own questions,” that’s fine. There’s got to be a purpose. Find it. It’s got to be purposeful. There’s got to be a reason for why we do how we do with inquiring, questioning.

[00:10:06.250] – Steve

You touched on inquiry and questioning not being the same thing. So let’s talk about what they are and then what the connections are.

[00:10:13.850] – Erik

Well, inquiry is the experience. So when I engage in inquiry, what I’m doing is I can be researching, I can be investigating, I can be experimenting. Those are the experiences that’s involved in inquiry. So inquiry is the umbrella, the big picture. Questioning is a way to engage in inquiry, true inquiry. You should be able to just come into a classroom and ask a question and throw it out there. And if they can’t respond to it, that’s okay. Because what you’re doing by asking a question, you’re not being instructional. When I say, okay, I want you to go and research in this, and I want you to go to investigate that. Okay, here’s this thing. I want you to experiment with this and that. That is not inquiry. That is instruction. I’m telling you what to do. But when I ask you a question, I’m inviting you in the experience. So if I asked you, “how did Edgar Allen Poe create an entire genre of literary fiction?” I don’t expect you to know that. If you do, great, because then I’m going to ask you, what do you mean?

[00:11:26.790] – Erik

And you’re going to go and explain it. So I turn the student into a teacher, and everybody’s going to remember that you answered it, not that I taught it. But then I’m going to say, “what if I told you that Edgar Allan Poe wrote the first short story featuring a detective that used deductive logic and reasoning to solve a crime? Who does that sound like?”

[00:11:47.250] – Steve

Sherlock Holmes?

[00:11:48.080] – Erik

You’re right. But what if I told you that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle actually based Sherlock Holmes on a character that Edgar Allan Poe created half a decade earlier? And then I have them read the Murders in a Remark. And I asked them, how is this the first detective mystery story? And how did this create an entire genre of literary fiction?

[00:12:13.400] – Steve

So is it fair to say that a goal of ours is sparking students to create their own questions for inquiry?

[00:12:25.260] – Erik

Yes and no. Now, that’s hard because questioning is natural and it’s innate, but something happens to us physiologically and socially, that we stop asking questions. Research shows – it was research conducted actually by an organization in England that children will ask between 200 to 500 questions a day between the age of two and five, all to their mother. And it’s a social and physiological reason. The physiological is their frontal cortex hasn’t developed yet, so they have their central cortex, which, as we know, is wild. That we know the frontal cortex is how we form language. The central cortex is basically wild in thought and unrestrained. And the social is, they’ll ask 200, 500 questions a day, all to their mother, because that’s the trusted adult. When they enter school, which is around five or six, two things happen. Now the frontal cortex is starting to develop. The language part of your brain is starting to develop. Students lose the innate ability to question because now they can form complete sentences. They can form declarative sentences. That’s why in first grade, so many first grade teachers, they encounter this with the kids who say, “I have a question.”

[00:13:50.510] – Erik

Well, what’s your question, Eric? “I went to McDonald’s last night.” That’s why in school, what happens is we need to reteach them how to question and be curious and to ask questions and we usually do that through grammar instruction or language instruction. How do you make interrogative statements? Socially, again, the way adults and children interact is question and answer. And someone who is under them, they do question and answer. But it’s the authority figure or the adult who asks the questions, not the child or the person who is working underneath them. They expect an answer. That’s not inquiry. That’s not questioning. That’s Q and A. So what happens with a child is with the age 2 and 5, the child learns through questioning, and they know it’s okay to make a mistake, and they learn through that. But when they go to school now, they’re getting a look of disapproval. Because if I said, what’s two plus two? And someone said five, now the teacher goes, looks down her glasses at them – “oh, I can’t be wrong. I can’t be incorrect.”

[00:15:09.420] – Erik

Or if a teacher says – this was me, this is my problem. In school, when the teacher said, does anyone have any questions? Yeah, I had tons. And the teachers, literally, my teachers would have to say, “about what I’m teaching Erik” and I’m like, “oh, no, no, I’m fine.” Because I’d be in English class and be like, you know, they won’t have any questions. And I go, “Yeah. Why do I get a chill down my back when my buddy Dave walks behind me?” And Erik, “what does that have to do with the lesson?” And see, that’s the thing. That time on task with it. You know, I actually even had it where teachers would go, “does anyone other than Erik have a question?” And that shot me down and that shut me up. But then, you know, what I did was I really pushed it. And I’d say, “Yeah, I have a question.” “What’s your question, Eric?” “Why anyone else except for me can I ask a question?” You know, that’s the thing, is that we want kids to question. And there’s research and studies that says, unfortunately, we kill questioning in school because we’re so focused on time on task. We gotta get through all those standards.

[00:16:13.110] – Erik

The curriculum map says we’re done on this date, and we need to make sure that we get done in this date. And that’s it. Doesn’t matter if you got it or not. We’re moving forward. We’re not tour guides, we’re teachers. We’re not done until the kids get it. And we may need to put that extra time in there. May need to shift some things. So in school, it usually happens around third grade, and I talk about this as a satirical thing to change behavior where now the kids need to be on task with their questions. In fourth and fifth grade, it now becomes more of a social thing because you’ll ask that question and the kids will go, “Duh.” Or “You’re so stupid.” Or, you know, “Hey, Erik, keep asking questions. We’re wasting time.” In middle school, the kids use questioning to rattle us teachers because they’ll ask us questions like, you know, my favorite thing is this – “does anyone have any questions? Raise your hand.” “Yeah. Do you think Bubbles a good name for a hamster?” In middle school, it’ll be like, hey, “Mr. Francis, do you think I should name my hamster Bubbles?”

[00:17:11.410] – Erik

“Erik, what does that have to do with the lesson? Doesn’t have to do with anything.” See, now it’s becoming more of that. It’s become more of a challenge. So by the time they get to high school, kids are basically like, just tell me what I need to do. What’s the answer you want? What do I need to do? Four years in, out and done. We need to have the kids question. We need to basically stimulate their thinking with questions. That’s what a good question does. We need to pique their curiosity, interest, and wonder with a question. And we need to expand their knowledge like I did with you with Edgar Allan Poe, or extend their thinking. And we also need to have them basically encourage them to express and share their learning. It’s not what I can tell you and teach you. It’s what you learn and how you can share with me. And that’s the thing where I usually say to my kids, I said, don’t give me the answer I want and don’t just give me the answer. Care. Care to share what you know about what you learn.

[00:18:14.170] – Erik

Care to share what you understand or be aware of what you learn. Because that’s also, if you think about it, that’s actually a life skill. Because when we get in, grow up, and we do work, we want to give our very best. Show us what your best is. Show me through your responses how much you know. And if it’s a certain level, then that’s what you get. But what could I do as a teacher to help you get a better evaluation, a better grade, lack of a better word, and do you want to.

[00:18:50.400] – Steve

So let me float a thought by you that I sometimes put out to people. If I’m a teacher, and I went to a conference and attended lots of different learning sessions, I suggest to people that the learning you leave there with is great. Probably the bigger bonus are the questions you left there with. I taught a great high school course and if at the end of the course the kids have more questions that couldn’t get solved or dealt with…

[00:19:26.360] – Erik

I call the personal question where I say to kids, okay, so you’ve learned a little bit here. I’ve told you a little bit here. What questions do you have? I actually do this in my professional development where I’ll give them my objectives and the outcomes for the day and then I’ll say, what do you want me to address and what do you want to take away from today? And I take the card and if I have them for that half day or full day PD, I’ll talk about questioning and I’ll present the my ideas with it for maybe about 30, 45 minutes, sometimes an hour. Then we go to the bathroom and in that five to ten minute times, I’m looking through all their cards and I’m saying, what do they want me to address? And I’m shaping the rest of the PD based upon what it is that they need, they wanted me to address and what they wanted to take away from today. And that shows them that I’m not just coming in with the same PD I did yesterday or a week ago someplace else. Now, what’s really interesting is a lot of stuff they want to address or they want to take away is what I already planned because, you know, you do this long enough, but you do it.

[00:20:37.180] – Erik

And what I also like to try to do with it is, you know, we’re at a time where you can go see a rock concert and they can come to your town and you can see what the set list was and you look at it and go, okay, so what song are they going to play next? And that’s sometimes what some PD looks like. Okay, so this is where at this point, this is where Erik’s going to talk about this. Or even when it’s a keynote. Oh, we’re 35 minutes in. This is where Erik’s going to talk about this. And tears going to fall from his eye or you know, he’s a photo his knees or talk about. Okay. What I try to do is it’s something that’s really interesting – Jon Bon Jovi and Bon Jovi does this in their concert. They play the set list, but then they pull something out from their catalog that they didn’t play at the last concert. So what happens is, and I do this actually when I, if I’m at a summit and I’m presenting more than once, the same thing I’m questioning I’ll talk about this during this presentation and I’ll talk about the same thing.

[00:21:34.300] – Erik

But then maybe I’ll add this because I’m learning what the audience is, and I’m also engaging my audience. I have a bunch of slides, and I’m moving all around through my slides, not just in a sequential order, but like, hey, I think they’re ready for this. Oh, you know what? This will be good. Or talk amongst yourselves. I’m going to throw this slide in because I think you guys would like it. That gets people learning, because what happens is when they go to lunch or they go in the hall and say, what’d you see? Oh, I saw Erik Francis. Well, what do you talk about? Oh, he talked about this. Well, he didn’t talk about that in my session. Oh, yeah, he talked about… And that’s what gets them curious, and that’s hopefully what gets them to go to their administrators, say, hey, we want more time with Eric, because he talked about this and I want to have that.

[00:22:12.500] – Steve

So would you connect that to a high school teacher who’s teaching three or four classes a day that are supposedly the same content?

[00:22:22.240] – Erik

Yes. You gotta respond to your staff. Sorry – not your staff, your students. Okay, I said staff because I used to do it in professional development. See where your students are going. If you feel your students are ready for that, ask that question. If you feel that your students might like if we went into this, ask that question. If your students ask the question, that’s better, because now you’re engaging with it. But that’s the creativity of questioning and inquiry from an instructor standpoint. There are people who are out there where they teach the kids how to ask questions. And there’s some people who are very good at that. I teach the teachers how to teach and learn with inquiring mind, through inquiry and by question, with good questions. I’ll teach them strategies to get the kids the question. But what my focus is, is how do I get those teachers to basically rethink why they do what they do, how they do what they do with questions. Because, again, we primarily ask questions to assess. And a lot of times we say things. They’re not even questions, they’re objectives.

[00:23:34.650] – Steve

So when I’m coaching a teacher, I always get excited when the teacher looks at me and says, “that’s really a good question.” So how do you define a good question?

[00:23:46.450] – Erik

Well, that’s the thing. So I have a criteria. I talk about my book, that a good question stimulates different levels of thinking. And what I mean by that is that I said different. Which means that if it’s a question that only has the kids remember and understand, that’s fine, because they’re thinking, okay? It’s not the question you ask. It’s the way that you use the questions. Like Eric Clapton sings, it’s in a way that you use it. So I can ask you, what is two plus two?

[00:24:12.580] – Steve

Four.

[00:24:16.190] – Erik

And then I go, you’re right. But why? And then you explain it, okay, now what are two numbers you want to use? Between one and ten. And you would pick…

[00:24:27.650] – Erik

Seven and eight.

[00:24:32.010] – Erik

Okay, so what’s seven plus eight?

[00:24:35.910] – Steve

15.

[00:24:36.690] – Erik

You’re right. But why? See, now it’s transferable learning. So that’s the first thing. It stimulates different levels of thinking. You can use it to check for and confirm knowledge, understanding, awareness, because that’s why we question. But it’s more about to expand the knowledge and extend the thinking. When you ask a question, you basically are expanding the knowledge of your audience or extending their thinking about something. So one of the things I do with questioning is again, we present information. How can we flip that? Every time you want to tell somebody something, put in front of it. So I could say to you, a fraction is actually a division problem. You take the denominator, you divide into numerator, and you’ll get your quotient. Okay, fine. Boom. What if I told you a fraction is actually a division problem? What if I told you, you could take your denominator, which is the bottom number, divide it into your numerator, and it’s actually a division problem where you’ll get a quotient that’s a decimal, see? Or maybe a whole. A whole number if the numerator is bigger than the denominator. But you see how I got you curious?

[00:25:54.810] – Erik

And that’s the other thing. Questions should pique curiosity, imagination, interest and wonder. When I taught math, I said, so how can we make football plays out of linear equations? Boom, I caught my kids. And also, it encourages kids to be the ones who talk. That’s a good question. A good question is not something that could just be answered with yes or no, true or false. It’s not a loaded question, which is basically like a trick question. I don’t like those questions and I hate that assessments use those. Because that’s not thinking. That’s trickery. Because if I answer one of them, then I should get at least half credit. It’s also not something that basically you can just pick one side and say yes or no. Basically the good questions should have the kids express and share their learning but also reflect before responding and it presents the instructional focus as a question.

[00:26:56.770] – Steve

So in my coaching work, when I get that response from someone, “that’s really a good question,” I connect that the reason I asked that question was the listening that I was doing.

[00:27:11.830] – Erik

Yes.

[00:27:12.500] – Steve

So I was kind of hearing the same thing with you talking about a teacher with students it’s and probably even more than listening, reading the students non verbals their tone of voice as they answer the question. So maybe they gave you the right answer but their tone of voice suggested unsureness that might cause you to ask a different next question.

[00:27:39.780] – Erik

Right. But again, it’s not so much get them to answer is to get them to think like you ask a question. And that’s the thing with coaching is that basically I say I’m going to ask you some questions but don’t feel like you have to answer them. Take it with you. Something to think about. And even with teaching, I was working with a couple of schools recently and I was in a third grade class for math and a sixth grade class for math. And what if I told you that they did the math right but their answers were incorrect. And what I would do, see, I said that “what if I told you.” Notice I made it to the next statement. Okay, so when I walk up and I say so what are we learning? Not what are we doing, it’s what are we learning? And they’ll tell you. So when I was with the third grade student, they said multi digit edition. I said “well how do we do that?” And she told me, said I use the traditional algorithm. I go oh that’s really interesting. What’s the traditional algorithm? See how I’m using question with that and she’s explaining it and I said “so how did you get that answer?”

[00:28:47.270] – Erik

So she had three digits and she explained it. First she added the ones, got her, got her value, carried the one. I didn’t want to go into the whole borrow the 10. That’s the teacher’s responsibility to do that. I don’t want to confuse a child. Then she added her tens, carried the one and then she added the hundreds and she got her answer. And I said what if I told you you did the math right, but your answer is not correct. Why? Let’s go through it. What’d you do? She did the ones. I said, “then what’d you do?” Borrow, carry the one. Okay, now she did the tens. What’d you do, carry the one? I said, now what’d you do when you get the hundred? She goes, “oh, I didn’t bring down the other digit.” And she fixed all her problems. See, that’s inquiry through questioning the other one. She was doing a math problem, 12 plus 30, and she had turned to a multiplication equation. So I said, “what are we learning?” Well, I have to turn addition problems into multiplication equations. I said, “how do you do that?” “I have to find the greatest common factor.”

[00:29:47.820] – Erik

I said, “okay, so that’s 12 plus 30. What’s the multiplication equation? How do you do it?” She goes, “well, it’s 3 and 3 times 4 is 12, and 3 times 10 is 30. So the multiplication equation is 3 times 4 plus 10.” And I said to her, “what if I told you you did the math right, but your answer is not correct?” And she goes, “what do you mean it’s not correct?” I go, well, what’s your answer there? 3. What do you have to look for the greatest common factor? Is that the greatest common factor? Oh, no, it’s six. See, so now she made a six times two plus five. That’s self correction. It’s not me being Alex Trebek going, ooh, you know, sorry about that. How much did you bet? Oh, your whole grade. No, it’s me using questioning because that’s what the kids remember. That’s when Mr. Francis questioned me. I even had contact. Someone said, you know, my kids remembered the math because you were this person. And they said, actually, it’s funny, I call myself, when I go into classrooms, the kids will go, “who are you?” I go, “Mr. Cena.”

[00:30:52.610] – Erik

And they go, “what’s your first name?” I say, John. They go, you’re John Cena. Go. Right, because you can’t see me. So. So, so that the kids go home. John Cena was in my class. So the thing is, is that they remember that experience. And see, that’s the whole thing with questioning and inquiry. Inquiry is the experience. Engage them in the experience through questioning. Okay, if I said to you, one of the ideas of the outsiders is family. We discuss what is a family. And I ask you, what’s a dictionary definition? What’s the literary. What’s a religious definition? Social definition. So in the book who’s the family? And the kids identify it. And I said, well, how does he feel about the others in the book? Well, he feels like they are like their brothers. And I said, so what is SC Hinton trying to say to us? Family is not just who you related to, it’s who you feel close to. You’re right. But why? Now they’re doing that. Give them the answer. In fact, the best way to engage with inquiry is say here’s the answer. Like, you and I can play a game.

[00:31:54.900] – Erik

And this would be. If we talk about DOK levels, this would be a DOK 3 because I have to think strategically and examine, explain with evidence. So I could walk in the room and go, My product is 20. What could my factors be? And you think about it, one of the students might go 5 and 4. Why? You’re right, but why? Because 5 times 4 is 20. You’re right, but why? Because when I have 5 and I add to itself 4 times or group it 4 times, I get 20. So what else could it be? 4 times 5? Why? Because basically. And I always forget the property wrong – I apologize for that. But so much stuff in our head and plus old age. And the thing is, they tell you what the associate the property is. I think it’s, I think it’s the associative property. And then I go, what else could be my factors? And maybe someone will say, well, 10 and 2. You’re right, but why? Because 10 times 2 is 20 and 2 times 20, what else could be my fact? See, so now you’re doing it. Okay, now I can say, who wants to give me their product?

[00:32:59.970] – Erik

So then you, Steve, give me a number. That’s your product. So give me any number between 1 in 100.

[00:33:08.164] – Steve

50.

[00:33:08.290] – Erik

Okay, 50. What could his factors be and why? And the kids all walk out, okay, maybe two times 25. Maybe one times 50. Maybe five times 10. So see how they’re doing that? What am I teaching you? Absolutely nothing. What are you learning? So deeply because you own it. It’s basically true, you know student-centered inquiry. And it’s truly Socratic. Socrates didn’t call people into the coliseum and say, okay, you’re the inner circle, you’re the outer circle. You can discuss, you can’t. That’s your role. What is the meaning of life? It was throw the question out there, see what people can do with it, and have them come up with their responses to reasoning. That’s what I call true inquiry. And again, what distinguishes what I do with it? It’s not so much getting the kids to come up with questions, because that’s not only a learned skill, that’s also a comfort level. They have to feel comfortable in your class, not only to ask questions, but also feel that they can provide any answer, whether it’s accurate or acceptable or appropriate.

[00:34:21.040] – Erik

They have to feel comfortable they can share it. And what you do is you use questioning to create that environment. And I’ll also tell you, Steve, questioning can also protect us as teachers, because one of the things we have here, especially in the States, is anything we say and do these days can and will be misrepresented and misinterpreted to our administration or our school boards. But if I ask the question, I can’t control what comes out of the child’s mouth. When I taught history, I used to have the kid, one kid come and go, hey, “Mr. Francis, did you know Hitler was Time’s man of the Year?” “Yeah.” “How come we’re not discussing that, Mr. Francis?” “It’s not part of the curriculum.” “But don’t you think that’s interesting?” Well, okay. What’s the standard I can tie it to? Ooh, argumentation research. Okay, good. Why was Hitler named Time’s man of the Year? And should that designation have been taken away based upon what he did or not? And now I have them researching and investigating. Erik, what do you teach in your class about Hitler being Time’s man of the year? I said I didn’t tell him he was Time’s man.

[00:35:30.780] – Erik

Kid came in and asked that. Instead of me going and giving my opinion of it, because we live in a world where you can say, I walk on water and everyone said, Erik can’t swim. You know that basically we need to have the kids come up with their own answers. And if they come up with something that’s so outrageous, guide them. Don’t judge them, guide them. But also understand, you know, you’re not just allowing basically them to just kind of say whatever they want. You got to use your teacher discretion. Because if something borders on insightful words or insightful speech, then that becomes a whole different thing. Now it’s not educational. Now it’s disciplinary.

[00:36:12.390] – Steve

Well, Erik, you followed through on my expectations when I read the title of your book and sent out the invitation. Tell folks the easiest way that they can connect with you to find your books and your writing and your work and follow up with you.

[00:36:30.740] – Erik

So my books on questioning. One was published by Solution Tree. That was, “Inquiring Minds Want to Learn.” And you can find that at solutiontree.com. The other one was, “Now That’s a Good Question.” The difference is, Now That’s a Good Question identifies the different questions we can ask that will promote cognitive rigor. Inquiring Minds is more so how I can phrase and pose those good questions to teach and learn through inquiry and by questioning. So there are great compliments. So the ASD one is at ascd.org and inquiring minds wants to learn is at solutiontree.com inquiring minds, if you wouldn’t mind, can I give people some strategies that they can use like right after they listen to you and start their questioning journey?

[00:37:15.930] – Steve

Sure, go ahead.

[00:37:17.070] – Erik

Okay, so here’s the first thing. I want everyone to take their standard or their learning target or their objective. Notice it is often phrased as a directive. It’s got a verb and tells you what to do. If you put “how do you” in front of all your objectives of your standards, or instead of saying “I can,” you say “how do you” for your learning target, you will have a good question for assessment. If you say “how can you?” and put that in front of your statement of objective or replace your I can statement or we will be able to with “how can you,” you create a good question that’s standards driven and will also set the instructional focus and service assessment. If you put “how could you” in front of your objectives now you’ve turned that objective from that standard or that learning target into a good question that basically promotes inquiry. And if you’re thinking, well, wait a minute, can I just say how could you and turn all those objectives into a question for assessment, instruction and inquiry, I would say to you, you’re right. So again, those three questions run us through the four.

[00:38:33.480] – Steve

Yeah, run us through the questions real quick in a row.

[00:38:36.910] – Erik

So take your standard, put “how do you” in front of all your objectives, now you have a good question for assessment and that will have the students comprehend and communicate their learning at a DOK 2, at least because they have to explain. If you say “how can you,” that replaces the objective or the learning target where we won’t say the student will fluently multiply multi digit numbers using an algorithm or I can fluently multiply multi digit number. Now you’re saying “how can you fluently multiply multi digit numbers using an algorithm?” If I say “how could you,” now that’s inquiry. And that always stimulates deeper levels of thinking. Because now you’re wondering, well, wait a minute, is there more than one way? How could I do that? What it does, it also makes the instruction invitational. And instead of having the kids have this obscure standard that’s difficult to read because when you turn into a question, it’s easier to comprehend. And if you say “how do you, how can you, how could you,” and the kids would say, “I don’t know.” You can say, “well, what is it that you don’t know and understand?

[00:39:49.540] – Erik

And how would you phrase that to me as a question?”

[00:39:52.220] – Steve

thanks. I will be sure to stick your website in the lead into the podcast so people can easily find you out there.

[00:40:01.340] – Erik

Thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you for having me on your show.

[00:40:06.260] – Steve [Outro]

Thanks for listening folks. I’d love to hear what you’re pondering. You can find me on Twitter or LinkedIn at Steve Barkley, or send me your questions and find my videos and blogs at barkleypd.com.