Ofsted

Teaching’s effectiveness can be judged by its effect on pupils’ achievement and personal development over time.

The quality of everyday teaching across a school builds the learning, progress and achievement of children day in and day out over weeks, terms and years. This is achievement over time. This is what you are interested in as a teacher or leader and this is what inspectors are interested in. Period!

And the dynamic art which is questioning remains the only stand-alone classroom teaching skill mentioned in the School inspection handbook. This has been the case in recent years and from September 2015, it remains so.

Inspectors will not ignore teachers’ other skills, but the fact that questioning is mentioned by name shows its importance. We all know why: questioning is just so important for assessment, checking on understanding, reassuring young minds and supporting children to think hard and deep.

In the September handbook, questioning is referred to in the ‘Outstanding’ and ‘Good’ grade descriptors for teaching:

‘[Outstanding] teachers ... use questioning highly effectively and demonstrate understanding of the ways pupils think about subject content.’

‘Good teachers ... use questioning skilfully to probe pupils’ responses and they reshape tasks and explanations so that pupils better understand new concepts. Teachers tackle misconceptions and build pupils’ strengths.’

Therefore, high quality questioning should be a priority for every teacher across a school. Active Questioning offers strategies and approaches which can help. It is up to leaders and teachers to agree on the way in which they develop the quality of questioning.

Some quotations from Ofsted publications regarding schools that have used Active Questioning can also be found in the Introduction.