Use your e-diary
to record your thoughts about open and closed questions.
Using open, closed, and
leading questions
1.
Read the following passage of text, and think about
possible questions, based on the text that could promote
discussion and thinking.
2.
Write down three closed questions and three
open questions. If
possible try to use the closed questions first as
an introduction to the open questions.
East African nomadic
people speaking the Masai Sudanic language. The
Masai traditionally herded their cattle freely across
the highlands of Kenya. Probably at the height of
their power in the mid-19th century, they suffered
from the British colonization of Africa and the
resultant ecological and political changes. Rinderpest,
an infectious febrile disease, apparently accompanied
the British, decimating the cattle herds that supplied
the Masai with milk and blood; famine and then smallpox
followed. The weakened Masai attacked rather than
co-operated with the new rulers. In 1904 and 1912-13
the British government relocated the Masai population
to distant southern Kenya and Tanzania, where they
now live.
Masai males are
rigidly classed by age into boys, warriors, and
elders. Girls often have their marriages negotiated
by their fathers before they are born. Both boys
and girls undergo circumcision ceremonies. Older
women enjoy the same status as male elders. The
Masai, most of whom are nomadic throughout the year,
live in kraals, small clusters of cow-dung huts
constructed by the women. Today the Masai number
approximately 250,000. They remain a pastoral people.
"Masai,"
Microsoft (R) Encarta. Copyright (c) 1994 Microsoft
Corporation. Copyright (c) 1994 Funk & Wagnall's
Corporation
Further Reading - try entering the word "Masai"
in a search in www.google.com
3. Write
e-mail to to
your group to show them the open and closed questions you have composed.
Include a short paragraph to
mention the class discussion topics that could arise
when pupils try to answer your questions.
4.
Try to give some feedback to the rest of your group
on their list of questions and their suggested discussion
topics.
Use your e-diary
to record your thoughts about questions.
Optional reading:
planning
questions - this is about using probing and leading
questions and preparing questions while planning lessons.
managing
questions - this gives ideas about
encouraging questions from learners and how to handle
them.
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