Question Walk

Purpose: To give learners practice comparing and contrasting a wide variety of responses to a question or prompt.

Preparation Time: 5 minutes

Materials Needed: Analyze Responses Grids

Procedure:

1. Come up with a question (ex: What was the main idea of the story?) a sentence frame (ex: After reading this story, I now understand _____), or a prompt (ex: Write about how this story made you feel) for learners to respond to in writing. Give the learners a few minutes to think about and write down their responses.
2. Have all of the learners copy their responses down on the whiteboard. You can also give each learner a sheet of paper to write their responses on (ask them to write big), then post the papers on the walls around the room.
3. Give each learner a copy of the Analyze Responses Grid. Have the learners spend 5-10 minutes moving around the room and reading their peers’ responses. Periodically, ask them to stop and write down some of their observations on their grids.
4. Put the learners into small groups and have them share what they wrote down on their charts. If you have time, ask someone from each group to summarize the responses and report out to the whole class.  

Modification: For a multilevel class, have the learners work in partners to read and analyze the responses and complete the grid.

Transitions Integration Framework (TIF) category/skill/sub-skill:

Critical Thinking

Skill 1: Organize, analyze and illustrate relationships between components, items, and ideas

Sub Skills: b. Categorize items or ideas and articulate rationale (positive vs. negative, fact vs. opinion)

c. Synthesize information, ideas, and components in a meaningful and structured way