如何去问更好的问题？问问丹·帕尔曼教授

如何去问更好的问题？让我们来问问丹·帕尔曼教授吧

The Question Formulation Technique le to term papers on lemurs for stuents of professor Dan Perlman.

导读

早在2012年，丹·帕尔曼教授还没有建立布兰戴斯大学教学中心时，他看到了一则广告，宣传了一种他认为可能会鼓励学生在课堂上学习的技巧。 这种技巧被称为问题构想技巧（QTF），用于基础教育课堂，由正确问题研究所创建。 帕尔曼教授参加了QTF的第一场公开研讨会，他了解到尽管还没有人在高等教育中采用过QTF，但这项技巧可以在大学课堂中发挥巨大的潜力。 很快地，帕尔曼就在布兰戴斯大学的本科课程中采用了这种方法，并积极地在正确问题研究所中活动。

五年后，美国国家科学基金会联系到正确问题研究所，让其申请一笔拨款以支持一个项目。 科学基金会希望通过这个项目，能够使更多寻求资助的研究人员提出更有影响力的问题。 除了和研究所的其他同事一起工作外，帕尔曼教授还是项目的首席研究员，项目旨在系统地将QFT引入到高等教育中 - “问题改进模型:一个简单且可扩展的模型，用于提高博士生的问题构想技巧。 ”

在这篇文章中，Braneis Now与教学中心的创办负责人、生物学及环境研究教授帕尔曼一起，探讨了问题构想技巧这项教育方法以及学生们的反应，让我们一起看下去吧。

How o we ask better questions? Ask Professor Dan Perlman

**** In 2012, a couple years before he establishe the Center for Teaching an Learning at Braneis, Professor *Dan Perlman* remembers seeing an a for a technique that he thought might encourage stuent learning in his classroom.

The a was for the first public workshop on a technique use in K-12 classroom settings calle the Question Formulation Technique, which ha been create by the Right Question Institute. He attene the workshop an saw tremenous potential for the Question Formulation Technique (QFT) in college classrooms, but no one was using it in higher eucation - yet. Perlman soon aopte the metho in his unergrauate courses at Braneis an he became active with the Right Question Institute.

Five years later, the institute was approache by the National Science Founation (NSF) to apply for a grant to fun a project that the NSF hope coul result in more impactful questions from researchers seeking funing. Working with his colleagues at the Right Question Institute, Perlman is now principal investigator on a project to systematically introuce the QFT to grauate eucation - " The Question Improvement Moel: A Simple an Scalable Moel for Improving the Question Formulation Skills of PhD Stuents. "

BraneisNOW aske Perlman, founing irector of the Center for Teaching an Learning an professor of biology an environmental stuies about this approach to teaching an the reaction of his stuents. Dan Perlman

What is the Question Formulation Technique?
In the QFT, instea of the teacher asking a question, the teacher gives the stuents a prompt an they then brainstorm questions in response to the prompt in small groups. They on't stop to iscuss the questions; they're just trying to generate questions. The next step is to think about which questions seeme the most interesting, an work with those to improve the questions. I use the QFT at the beginning of the semester to shift the focus from me, the professor, to the stuents, an in so oing I signal that I want to hear from them. This is very beneficial because while they're eveloping their question-asking skills, they feel that they are helping to shape the curriculum, rather than having it coming from a teacher who is umping it onto them.

How oes the QFT work?
The QFT uses four rules for proucing questions. The Right Question folks spent years honing them, to get these in exactly the form they're in. 1. Ask as many questions as you can. 2. Do not stop to iscuss, juge or answer the questions. 3. Write own every question exactly as it is state, an 4. Change any statement into a question. A key part of the QFT is choosing the prompt, such as a phrase or a book title. For my Animal Behavior class, we use a visit to the Franklin Park Zoo as our prompt. We came back to the classroom an stuents broke into small groups an starte asking questions about things they' observe. We took all of their questions an sorte them. In the first roun of the QFT, stuents aske questions like, " How o animals know how to behave? " An then the next week, they use the most interesting of their questions as a prompt to generate further questions. In the secon week stuents generate more targete questions, " Were the animals making noises, an if so, what o these noises mean an how o they iffer from noises mae in the wil? " Out of this secon roun came almost all their term paper projects; they came up with really goo ieas for stuies. For example, after the secon roun of going through the QFT, one stuent's term paper was about the effects of the zoo environment on lemurs, " Vocalizations of Ringtaile Lemurs: Are they affecte by captivity? " So we starte with the trip to the zoo, went through two rouns of the QFT, an we got term paper projects.

What's the impact on stuents?
Stuents come to the Question Formulation Technique from a variety of backgrouns, an the QFT helps all of them. Stuents learn to ask broaer ranging an eeper questions. An I think even the sharpest stuents, who are alreay asking really goo questions, get to take it a step further. Stuents who are only asking very concrete, straightforwar, simple questions, learn how to ask better questions through working with a group of their peers. The QFT is being use in hunres of thousans of K-12 classrooms, an with unergras at other universities. Is Braneis the only place where this new metho is being use with grauate stuents? As far as I know, our work with PhD stuents in the Life Sciences at Braneis was the first such use. Since then we've worke with Engineering an Science PhD stuents at both UMass Lowell an Northeastern University – an well over 100 stuents have gone through the NSF-fune program.

Do you think it's been a success?
As eucators, we on't typically teach the skill of asking questions, but I think you can argue that it's one of the three or four most important skills that a college stuent, or any stuent, can learn. The QFT is one very goo way to help stuents evelop their question asking skills. We're encourage by the early results from the stuy an we are eveloping ways to objectively assess stuents' progress in question formulation.

Do stuents get frustrate because the focus is on asking questions an not getting answers?
This came up when I gave a workshop at UMass Lowell, as many of the professors there aske, " Don't the stuents want answers? " I tol them that you can use the QFT in ifferent ways, some of which put the onus for fining answers on the stuents. In the case of my Animal Behavior course, the Franklin Park Zoo trip an two rouns of the QFT helpe the stuents create research questions that they were going to attempt to answer through semester-long research papers. So that was perfect. An the better questions they were asking were not something that they coul answer right away. It took months an 25 pages to answer them. For PhD stuents, this is a great way to jump-start their thinking about research questions. As one note after a training session, " It was remarkable how very unique an unexpecte questions can be generate with this process." In fact, a senior professor who sat in on a training was surprise that the QFT le to a new research question.