Differentiating Instruction through Open-Ended Questions

Hello again, I hope everyone has had a good week so far.

This week in EDBE 8F83 we dove into the concept of open-ended questions. As we discussed in class, open-ended questions are questions that have many different strategies and answers, and suit a broad range of ability levels. In addition, in the case of math focused open-ended questions, they need to be focused on math that matters (Amy Lin, Personal Communication, Sept. 29th 2016). These are not to be confused with open-routed questions which involve one question, one answer and many different ways to get to that one answer. I know in the past I have mixed up these two, so it is important to note that these are different kinds of questions.

An example of an open-ended question would be:

The slope of a line is negative and travels through the point (5, -1). What other point is on this line?

In my past experience with mathematics I don't have much experience with open-ended questions. If I think back to my high school math experience, I don't remember my teachers giving my classes open-ended questions. And if they did, they weren't very memorable and didn't stick with me past high school. Once I got to university, there were no open-ended questions in sight. There was always a question with one answer and one answer only. University mathematics was very black and white.

Now that I have finished my undergraduate degree and am completing my Bachelor of Education, I am starting to truly understand the importance of using open-ended questions to differentiate instruction. Questions of this format "show children that their teachers trust them to have good ideas, think for themselves, and contribute in valuable ways." It enables students to take control of their own learning and take it in the direction that they see fit. These questions still aim to teach students a specific concept, but allow them each get to the understanding of that concept using a unique path. Open-ended questions get the entire class involved in the lesson by starting meaningful conversation about the topic at hand (What is Open-Ended?). Each student may start with their one unique way of solving a problem, but by the end of the discussion they may walk away with many different ways to answer the problem. Open-ended questions allow all students, regardless of learning style or ability level to get involved in class discussion. This changes the classroom environment from a lecture style where the teacher has all the information to a environment where everyone, including the teacher is learning from each other.

This image visualizes how each learner is different and unique in their own way.

 Retrieved from https://goo.gl/F1Ce1W

Additionally, in order to accommodate for the many different learners in each classroom, teachers need to make sure that their assessments also are differentiated. This is especially important in mathematics because often teachers gravitate towards tests and quizzes as the only assessments of learning in their classroom. But the reality is, not all students preform well on tests. Many students benefit from other forms of assessment in order to evaluate their learning. As we talked about in class, there are many different assessment techniques that can be used in mathematics other than tests and quizzes. Some examples are observations, discussions, interviews, and group problem solving assignments. By providing a variety of assessment tools teachers can accurately assess student learning in their mathematics classroom.

Overall, this week I learned that differentiating instruction and assessments is extremely important. By focusing on open-ended questions, teachers can give each student a chance to contribute to class and allow students to learn from each other. By incorporating open-ended questions into my classroom, I hope to help each student enjoy math class.