QUESTIONS THAT CONSTRUCT STUDENTS’ SELF-CONFIDENCE

Reveal “teaching to the test” among educators and you will certainly hear a lot about what is wrong with education today and probably more about the importance of teaching critical thinking (and how this cannot be done when you are teaching to the test). Let me suggest a slightly different take on working with tests and the development of, if not critical thinking, greater self-awareness among students as learners— teaching with the test as a form of Socratic mentoring.

What do I mean by teaching with the test? I see my interactions with students primarily in terms of providing structure and guidance for self-reflection to assist students in becoming more active and self-aware learners. Teaching with the test means providing opportunities for students to practice reading, analyzing, and answering questions before taking high-stakes assessments to complete the course. Because the purpose of the practice question is to structure conversation, the question should lead to additional questions and opportunities for students to do the hard work of explanation and clarification.

In addition, because the initial practice question stands, in a sense, between the student and me, it opens up space for self-reflection and the development of metacognitive skills. In a typical exchange, a student might encounter the following questions as they work with multiple-choice style questions: Why did you select “c” as the best option? What was the reasoning behind eliminating selection “a”? If we rephrase the question to read “x”, how does this affect your understanding of the question? If you focus on the relationship between concept “x” and concept “y,” does this help you to narrow down your options? If we change the facts of the scenario to include “x,” would one of the available options still be the best choice? As you can see, the method here is to respond, as much as possible, to student answers with additional questions. This brings me to the link between teaching with the test and what I am calling Socratic mentoring.

What do I mean by Socratic mentoring? Notice I am not using the term Socratic method. In part, this is because I want to avoid some of the debates associated with the real Socrates or what it means to describe a method as Socratic, and focus instead on how three images of Socrates found in three of the Platonic dialogues (torpedo fish, gadfly, and midwife) can provide insight into our work with students. describes Socrates as a torpedo fish because of the paralyzing effect of his questioning. Socrates accepts part of this description by claiming the shock of ignorance prepares the way for understanding. I like to think of the use of practice questions as a way of providing this “shock” by arresting a typical student’s flow of thought.

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I at Maimpis Integrated School, Division of City of

The author is Teacher San Fernando (P)

REYMON V. PADIS