Building knowledge is the goal of education.  However, according to Stephanie Harvey in Comprehension Going Forward (Keene, 2011, p. 117), children’s curiosity and list of questions are replaced with the notion they are in school to answer teacher’s questions, not ask them. 

I read this chapter coincidentally the same week a good friend recommended I watch Sugata Mitra: Build a School in a Cloud TED Talk. The video is only twenty-two minutes long and not only entertaining but thought-provoking.    Mitra speaks about an experiment he conducted with children in the slums of India to see what they would do with his “hole in the wall computer.”  The results of the experiment are quite amazing and lead to his vision for Self Organized Learning Environments (SOLE) where the students are responsible for their learning, ask their own questions, and work together to solve problems creatively.  

A similar vision is also reflected by Harvey who states, “Curiosity and thoughtfulness are at the center of engaged teaching and learning.”  Curiosity is what lead Mitra to conduct these experiments in the slums of India and also what propelled the children to figure out how to use the computers and learn about complex topics without any instruction or guidance. 

Reading this chapter and watching the video made me evaluate my virtual teaching environment which is currently very different that the SOLEs envisioned by Mitra.  However, I do think we are slowly shifting towards a more student-centered learning
environment where student questioning and curiosity is encouraged to build knowledge.              

                                                       Reference

Keene, E. O., Zimmermann, S., Miller, D., Bennett, S., Goudvis, A., Buhrow, B.,
       Cervetti, G., & Larner, M. (2011). Comprehension going forward: Where we are  
       and what\'s next. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.   

In the virtual school setting, asking students questions during Discussion Based Assessments (Oral Exams) takes place 2-4 times per semester to ensure academic integrity and student mastery of content.   To prepare for these discussions, I review the objectives for each lesson and use it as a guide for my conversation with my students.  In Chapter 8 of Strategies That Work (Harvey, 2007, p. 123) it discusses authentic questions versus assessment questions. This got me thinking about my questioning strategy.  Although my conversation with my students is dynamic (I can steer them in the right direction or ask the question in a different way, they can ask for clarification, etc.), I realized I ask assessment questions the majority of the time.

Example assessment questions I ask in my Language Arts and Photography courses:

- What is the theme of the story?  
- What was the conflict in the story? 
- What comes after exposition on the plot pattern?  
- What is the rule of thirds? 
- Why does the image appear upside down in your pinhole camera? 
- What are aperture and shutter speed and how are they related? 

These types of questions are necessary to monitor comprehension and academic growth, but I wanted to explore more authentic questions in my Discussion Based Assessments.  

To do this, I invited my high school Creative Photography students to attend a live
virtual lesson that allowed for group discussion through a photo critique to encourage new thinking and prompt new insight through authentic questions.  I posted the photo below and asked the following questions:   

- Discuss how this photo demonstrates one the photographic principles you learned in   this module?
- If you had to make one change to this image, what would it be and why? 

Student responses included:
    - The image follows the rule of thirds because the woman is not centered but    
       positioned in the right third of the picture.  
     - I would change the composition so the woman was pictured in the left third of the 
       frame so the active space is in front, rather than behind her. 
     - I would convert this to black and white to draw more attention to the subject in the
       photo. 

We also practiced more formal photo critiques using the following questions and photos:
- Observe – What do I notice first?
- Analyze – Describe the photo in detail using art and photography vocabulary?  
- Interpret – What do you think it means?
- Evaluate – You are the judge now. How would you rate this artwork overall? 

This questioning strategy allowed students to consider the technical and emotional aspect of photography, elaborate on their classmate’s answers, and pose questions of their own.  Overall, I found it to be a successful sessions that both the students
and I enjoyed.  

I am currently working on a website just for my photography classes that will allow me to create a teacher and student photo gallery.  My goal is to post photos weekly and have a poll or comment section available to promote authentic questioning and encourage student participation and interaction.