Open Questions Demand More
Dillon found genuine open questions, where the teacher does not know the answer, produce the most extended student reasoning. Not every question needs a predetermined destination.
The strategy, as published
Exactly as it appears on the card
Part of The Quality of Questions in 04 Questioning & Discussion, where it sits alongside its neighbouring strategies, the infographic and the thinking for the whole area.
Why you might use it
The problem it may help with
Most classroom questions have a destination the teacher already holds, and students know it. Dillon found that genuine open questions, the ones where the teacher does not know the answer, produce the most extended student reasoning.
That is a different thing from a closed question in open clothing. Guess what I am thinking is a game, not an enquiry, and students play it efficiently rather than thoughtfully.
What it might look like
One version of it, in a classroom
An English teacher asks which character in the novel changes most, genuinely undecided herself. Students take different positions, and because there is no answer to converge on, they have to argue from the text. The discussion runs longer than planned and does not resolve, which is fine.
Try it
A way to begin
Plan one genuinely open question into next week: one where you would find it hard to say what a right answer looks like.
What to notice
Reading what happens
- The length of the reasoning compared with your closed questions, which is what Dillon measured.
- Whether students begin addressing each other rather than routing everything through you.
- Your own urge to steer the room towards a view you privately hold.
Things to think about
Before and while you use it
- Not every question needs a predetermined destination, but many still will. Open questions do their work partly because they are occasional and genuine, not the default.
- An open question still needs something to reason with. A class without secure knowledge of the novel cannot argue about it.
Technology second
Where technology fits
A shared whiteboard or discussion board from your school's approved set can hold the range of positions an open question produces, and it keeps the reasoning there to return to in a later lesson, so a useful conversation is not lost the moment the lesson moves on. It can also bring in students who would not venture an unfinished idea aloud; the thinking still has to be theirs.
The wider thinking
Where the evidence sits
Dillon's studies of questioning are unusual for how sceptical they are about questions themselves; this card and its neighbour on alternatives both come from that scepticism. The card’s attribution stands as published: Dillon.
The fuller picture, sources included, is in further reading and evidence for Questioning & Discussion.
Keep exploring
Where next?
Back to this strategy in 04 Questioning & Discussion, across to what you're trying to improve, or into all 144 at once.
Want to take this further?
Support is available
Pedagogy First gives you a starting point. If you want support exploring how approaches like this can work across your school, trust or professional learning programme, that work is available.