Improving Chinese junior high school students’ ability to ask critical questions

Abstract

The present study explores ways to enhance students’ question-asking ability (i.e., the ability to ask critical questions), which is the premise of scientific inquiry and a precondition for effective science teaching. A survey of junior high school students in Zhejiang province in China showed that students’ questioning behavior was not well developed and that their ability and willingness to question authority were weak. These results are consistent with an educational culture that dictates that textbooks and science teachers are always correct and cannot be questioned. The intervention involved several designed cases that included the explicit teaching of questioning strategies and ample opportunities to ask questions for inquiry and question card use. After the intervention, a dependent t-test of several dimensions was conducted, the students’ question-asking consciousness and question quality were compared, and the frequency distribution of different levels of questions was analyzed and compared. The development of question-asking ability was further identified in the interviews. The efficacy and implications of the treatment for enhancing the critical question-asking ability of middle-school students in Chinese science classrooms are discussed. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 9999:963–987, 2017