Teachers ask many questions automatically. Separate socio-psychological questions (relationships, routines) from pedagogical ones (checking and extending learning), and balance closed with open.
Framework (Read’s own)
- Socio-psychological: build relationships, routines, respect, discipline.
- Pedagogical: closed (low demand; recall; good for beginners) vs open (high demand; reasoning, metacognition).
Moves
- Prepare key questions before the lesson; sequence easy → hard.
- Distribute questions; don’t let the keenest always answer.
- Wait time before repeating, rephrasing or redirecting.
- Respond by accepting, praising, extending, recasting or prompting self-correction rather than rejecting.
- Build question-formulation into tasks: “What questions would we like to find answers to?”
Limits
Open questions overload low-level learners. Be ready to recast or accept L1 answers.
Apply in my context (Claude)
- Wait time is the cheapest high-leverage change (Rowe’s research: 3+ seconds improves answer length and quality). Easy to observe for a DELTA M2 PDA action point.
- Flyers Speaking Part 4 / KET Speaking Part 2 need open answers. Practise open-question turns from Movers upward rather than leaving them to exam prep.
Connections
- Learning to learn starts in primary · Focus on form vs focus on formS (recasting answers)