Each day, teachers will have students asking them questions. These questions could be anything academic to a question that is on their mind about what is for lunch. As teachers, it is important that we know how to guide our students to asking and developing appropriate questions. In addition to questions, this section is focusing on teachers developing beneficial and fruitful discussions. To learn more about this keep reading below!
What is Domain 3B? Danielson's Domain 3B is all about teachers helping students discover more opportunities and develop greater understanding. The two specific areas that this domain focuses on is questioning and discussions that will occur in the classroom. The discussions that happen in the classroom should be exciting and animated rather than boring and dull. Students should be looking forward to in class discussions and the class discussions should produce questions and deeper thinking from the students. This domain is also emphasizing the importance of the teacher instructing how to properly do class discussions and small group talks. If the students don't know how to properly form questions or to properly use in class discussion, then in class talk will not be productive for the students. This domain wants teachers to completely understand what is a productive discussion would look like as well as good questioning techniques. Why is Domain 3B important? For teachers to use classroom time wisely it is key that small group discussions, large group discussions, and questions are included to produce student interest and thinking. This domain is to develop teachers questioning techniques as well as providing guidance for class discussions. Students are naturally curious, therefore it is the teacher's job to develop that curiosity and lead to deeper thinking of the students. This questioning method should also produce a discussion where students are formulating their own questions and working towards a high level questioning methods. This domain also wants to improve the student discussions. The discussions that occur in class should be engaging and exciting. There should be no need to drag out student participation, rather there should be an abundance of participation among students. What are the elements of Domain 3B? This domain consists of three different elements. Each of these elements are labeled below along with a brief description of what the element is about.
Quality of Questions and Prompts:
In this element, teachers should be developing student's understanding through high quality questions. Not only should teachers be developing understanding, but the questions should cause the students to think and reflect upon the question provided. Once students have thought through the questions, the students should come up with theories and ideas that they can test against fellow students in group discussions
Discussion Techniques
This element is focusing on teachers not teaching content, but rather asking questions that help to include all students and hear every student's opinion on the question asked. Students should also engage in discussions that do not directly involve the teacher. Students should be asking each other questions and posing challenges to each other in certain discussion groups.
Student Participation
Teachers need to make sure that all students are able to engage in the discussion. In many classes, there will be a group of students who are always answering questions and asking questions not allowing for the other students to answer. It is the teacher's job in this element to make sure that there is a chance for each student to answer and participate by using a variety of techniques or tools.
How to incorporate Domain 3B into the classroom. As with many different domains that have been brought up there are countless different ways to incorporate this domain into the classroom. I will only be mentioning two different ways to incorporate domain 3B, but if you have any more suggestions, don't hesitate to contact me! The first way to incorporate Domain 3B into the classroom is by using the tech tool Flipgrid. Flipgrid is this amazing tech tool where the teacher can post a prompt or question and every student has to post a response using a video. This tool makes sure that every student is participating, and it also can create more questions or discussions among the students themselves. Other students in the class can comment or like the videos that have been posted. The next day in class, the teacher could show a few of the videos that were posted in response to the prompt, then continue the discussion. There is another section where the details about this tech tool. Click on the attached button to learn more about Flipgrid.
The second way to incorporate Domain 3B into the classroom is by having students edit each others paragraphs for a specific subject. The teacher could use a tech tool to assign groups so that they are not planned and from there, the students are given a rubric which tells them how many questions and comments that they need to place on their classmate's paper. This is working on both the student's questioning as well as opening a door for student discussion. When the papers are returned to the original author, the students then would discuss their comments and reasoning for the comments that were provided as well as answer the questions that were posed. As mentioned, there are many more ways for this domain to implemented into the classroom, and I am open to hear any more options.
References: (2017). Schools.nyc.gov. Retrieved 3 November 2017, from http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/4D286288-D643-485A-B591-FFA3BC889629/0/danielsonrubricdomain3.pdf