Student Guide to developing Essential Questions

1. Essential Questions
What are they and how do you
write one?

2. What Is an Essential Question?
• A question you have to
think critically to answer.
Instead of simply looking
up an answer, you need
to conduct research and
create an original
answer.

3. An Essential Question…
–provokes deep thought.
–solicits information-gathering and
evaluation of data.
–results in an original answer.
–helps students conduct problem-related
research.
–makes students produce original ideas
rather than predetermined answers.
–may not have an answer.
–encourages critical thinking not just
memorization of facts.

4. Types of Essential Questions
• Which one?
• How?
• What if?
• Should?
• Why?

5. “Essential vs. Traditional
Questions"
• Not Essential:
–“What is it like to live in Hong Kong?"
• Essential
–Which city in Southeast Asia is the best
place to live?
• Not Essential:
–“What is AIDS?"
• Essential:
–Which serious disease most deserves
research funding?

6. “How Questions"
• Example:
What are some
sustainable solutions to
environmental problems
in your neighborhood,
and how could they be
implemented?

7. "What if Questions"
• What if questions are hypothetical,
questions which ask you to use the
knowledge you have to pose a hypothesis
and consider options.
• Examples:
–"What if the Cultural Revolution had
never happened?"
–"What if students didn’t have to go to
school?”

8. "Should Questions"
• Should questions make a moral or
practical decision based on evidence.
• Examples:
–"Should we clone humans?“
–"Should we discontinue trade with
countries that abuse human rights?"

9. "Why Questions"
• Why questions ask you to understand
cause and effect. "Why" helps us
understand relationships; it helps us get to
the essence of an issue.
• Examples:
–"Why do people abuse drugs?"
–"Why is the death rate higher in one
Third World country than another?"

10. • What are Fat Question?
– Open-ended questions, which can be argued
and supported by evidence.
• Examples:
– Skinny Question: "When was the Declaration
of Independence signed?"
– Fat Question: "What would have happened
had we not signed it?”
Skinny vs. “Fat” Questions

11. How do you write an essential
question?
Consider the focus of the unit or
lesson activity:
•Digital Dossier
•Digital Citizenship
•Digital Footprint
•Cyberbullying
•Bullying

12. How do you write an
essential question?
Ideas for a good essential question:
1. may stem from your particular interests in a
topic (e.g. If you were a victim of
cyberbullying, what would you do?,
community resources (How is your school
dealing with bullying?)
2. Begin with the 6 typical queries that
newspaper articles address: Who? What?
Where? When? Why? and How?
3. From these questions formulate your
essential question.
4. Use: Which one? How? What if? Should?
Why?

13. Student Example
Developing an Essential Question
Five Supporting Questions about Muhammad Ali
1.HOW did he influence the Civil Rights Movement?
2.WHAT were the main reasons for him not going into the
military service?
3.WHEN did Ali decide not to participate in military service?
4.WHAT was the public reaction when Ali did not join the
military service?
5.WHAT were his punishment for not joining the military when
he was required under the DRAFT?
ESSENTIAL QUESTION
How did Ali influence other people of his race and the Civil
Rights movement when he refused to serve in the Military
because of his religious beliefs?

14. Examples of Essential
Questions

15. Examples of Open-ended
Questions
• How would you…?
• What would result if…?
• How would you describe…?
• How does…compare with…?
• What is the relationship between…?
• What would happen if…?
• How could you change…?
• How would you improve…?
• How do you feel about…?

16. Examples of
Open-ended Questions
• Why do you believe…?
• What is your opinion of…?
• What choice would you have made…?
• What would you do differently?
• Why do you feel…?
• How would you go about solving the
problem…?
• If you were in this position what would you
do?
• Why do you/don’t you support…?
• What could improve…?

17. Questioning Resources
• Asking Essential Questions
http://www.biopoint.com/ibr/askquestion.html
• The Key to Understanding Essential Questions
http://www.hannibal.cnyric.org/Acrobat
%20docs/ESSENTIAL%20QUESTIONS%20For
%20high%20School.pdf
• Themes and Essential Questions: Framing
Inquiry and Critical Thinking
http://www.greece.k12.ny.us/instruction/ELA/6-
12/Essential%20Questions/Index.htm
• Asking Essential Questions
http://www.il-tce.org/present04/flesser.pdf