Essential Questions

• The content you teach allows students to be able to answer your essential questions, but the content itself is not a direct answer to any essential question
• They stimulate interest and thought, get the students interested in what they will be learning
• They make you want to have a conversation
• They force the students to have to engage/manipulate the knowledge and skills in order to be able to answer the essential questions
• They have no direct, obvious “right” answers
• They sometimes have more than one possible answer
• They may stimulate debate
• They may stimulate philosophical perspective taking
• They raise other important questions, often across subject areas
• They address the conceptual foundations of the discipline
• They challenge thinking at higher levels (Bloom’s Taxonomy)
• Use questions as a way for students to develop and deepen their understanding of something
• Use to clarify misconceptions and challenge something that is assumed is true
• Don’t be afraid to go outside of the content when framing questions (e.g. Who is more wrong, the man who beats his wife or his neighbor that knows it happens, but does nothing?)