5 Quick and Easy Techniques For Essential Questions You Can Use Tomorrow

By Kate Wolfe Maxlow

So, you’ve written an awesome Essential Question for your unit.  The next question, then, is: how are you going to use it with students?  Remember, the whole point of Essential Questions is that students get to interact with and explore them; if the teacher keeps the Essential Question to him or herself, there’s almost no point to having it, other than as an interesting philosophical exercise.

Introducing students to Essential Questions doesn’t have to be a strenuous or time-intensive process that requires days of planning, but it should be more than simply posting the Essential Question on the board and reading it aloud to students. When written and used well, the Essential Questions and Understandings can become a framework for the entire unit, helping students to understand the relevance of their learning and make connections.

Therefore, here are some techniques that can be used in almost any classroom to introduce and use the Essential Questions with students.

1. The Think-Pair-Share

The Think-Pair-Share is one of the fastest, easiest ways to get students interacting with the Essential Question in a way that allows everyone to participate. The entire thing can take 10 minutes or less. The teacher introduces a strong Essential Question at the beginning of the unit, then has students turn and talk to partner.  It may be helpful to assign partners ahead of time, and to tell students how long you will give them to discuss the topic (usually 1-5 minutes, depending on the developmental stage of your students and the complexity of the question).  It may also be helpful to model to students how to engage in a Think-Pair-Share if they are not used to interacting with other students, showing them how to take turns in a conversation and build off what their partner said.

During the Think-Pair-Share, the teacher should monitor the various conversations, providing feedback and encouragement where necessary. Think-Pair-Shares work especially well if there is then a whole class debrief in some capacity.  This can be as simple as having various pairs share what they talked about or having some partners sum up what their partners said. For older students, you can also have them write down some of their initial thoughts on sticky notes, then have the entire class review them and look for common themes.

Think-Pair-Share can also be used to revisit the Essential Question at the beginning and the end of the unit.

2. Journaling

For students who are able to write, teachers can introduce the Essential Question and have students journal their responses.  This might work best for questions that could lead to more controversial discussions (such as, “Why do people fall in love?”) The teacher presents the Essential Question and then has students do a free write on the topic for 3-10 minutes (depending on the age of the students and the complexity of the question).  The teacher should monitor as students write, and review the journal entries briefly once they are complete.

Afterward, the teacher can also choose to do a Whole Class share out, or use a Think-Pair-Share to have students share their ideas with a classmate.

If using journaling, it is helpful to have students return to their first journal entry and update their thoughts partway through the unit.  A helpful strategy can be to have students write in one color during their initial response, then leave a page or more for updates.  During the updates, they can write in a different color.  The teacher can simply give students 5-10 minutes at the end of class a couple of times during the unit to have students update their journals with new information based on what they’re learning (this works really well as a closure activity or even as “exit ticket”).  At the end of the unit, students then compare their initial responses to their updated responses, and reflect on how their thoughts

3. K-W-L

The K-W-L is a teacher favorite for introducing a unit and works well with Essential Questions because it should also be revisited multiple times throughout a unit.  K-W-L stands for Know, Want to Know, Learned.  In the beginning of the unit, the teacher might introduce an Essential Question such as “How do you know what is true?” along with the learning intention: “We are learning about the scientific method.”  Students are then asked to combine both the Essential Question and the topic to not only say what they know about the scientific method, but how they use it to know what is true.  This can be completed independently by students, in pairs, or (especially for younger students) as a whole group with the teacher writing and modeling.

After students complete what they already know (or think they know; sometimes the KWL reveals misconception), then the teacher leads students through filling out the “Want to Know” section.

4. Questions From Questions

One of the hallmarks of Essential Questions is that they should spark more questions.  To that end, one great technique is to introduce the Essential Question to students, and before allowing them to respond, have them brainstorm 1-3 other questions that they would want to explore before answering the Essential Question itself.

For instance, let’s say that you’re using the Essential Question “How do you know when you have enough?” to study addition and subtraction in mathematics.  Questions that might naturally spring from this are: In the given scenario, is it better to have too a little too much, or not quite enough? How easy is it to get “more” if I don’t have enough the first time around?  Will an estimate be accurate enough, or do I need an exact answer to determine if I will have enough? What are the consequences of not having enough, or of having too much?

Note that the first time around, and potentially subsequently for younger students, the teacher might need to model this strategy for students.  Once modeled, older and/or more sophisticated students will be able to come up with their own questions and write them down (either independently or in groups), which will allow the class to review/compare and contrast each other’s questions.

5. Classroom Advance Organizer

Advance organizers are a great strategy for introducing a unit (the K-W-L) is actually an example.  In this case, the teacher can introduce an Essential Question and pair it with an appropriate thinking map on a large bulletin board.  For instance, for the Essential Question “What do humans owe the Earth?” the teacher might choose to use a Circle Map to start, giving students post-it notes and having them write down quick answers on those post-it notes (alternatively, the teacher might have students work in groups of 4-5, and use chart paper or bulletin board paper for each group).

The teacher and students then post their sticky notes onto the class (or small group) organizer.  As the unit progresses, the teacher and students will come back to the class graphic organizer at strategic points throughout the unit, and the teacher might give students another sticky note (preferably in a different color) and have them add to their understanding or update their own or a classmate’s sticky note.

The teacher and students might, throughout the course of the unit, also decide that an alternative structure for the graphic organizer is needed.  For instance, they might see themes emerge, and therefore move from a circle map to a T-bar or a chart that better categorizes the responses.

Do you have other quick and easy ways to incorporate Essential Questions into your classroom?  We would love to hear them!  

Kate Wolfe Maxlow is the Professional Learning Coordinator for Hampton City Schools. She can be reached at kmaxlow@hampton.k12.va.us.