Essential Characteristics:

1
Essential Characteristics
Nonessential Characteristics

• Questions that are considered safe and
  nonthreatening
• Questions that accept things the way they are
• Dont go below the surface
• Simple recall questions

• Explore territory considered off-limits or
  taboo
• Test claims of authority, institutions, and
  myths
• Probe beyond the surface, seeking validation and
  verity (truthfulness)
• Provide a reality check
• These questions are not universally appreciated
• Learned by avoiding ones own backyard and
  studying institutions of those who are far
  distant in time or geography

Irreverent Questions
Examples
Non-examples

• What do we know about witches and their beliefs?
• Are there such things as witches?
• When have we as a country gone on a witch
  hunt? Do we still do this?
• When is it better to remain truthful? To lie?

• Why does Rev. Parris believe that witchcraft is
  involved?
• What is Abigails relationship to Rev. Parris?
• Why does Mrs. Putnam dislike Rebecca Nurse?

2
Essential Characteristics
Nonessential Characteristics

• Its practice is rare
• Escapes the limitations of conventional wisdom
  and thinking
• Creating knowledge by wandering off course
• Involves scenario-building
• Involves leaving behind biases, presumptions,
  ignorance, and limitations in order to explore
  ideas

• Repeated basic questioning
• Conventional thinking
• No creation of new knowledge-stagnant knowledge
  growth

Irrelevant Questions (irrelevant means not
related to topic)
Examples
Non-examples

• How can people be so quick to believe the
  accusations against suspected witches?
• How were witches punished?
• How did people protect themselves from witches?
• How did they put all these witches in jail?
• How could something like this happen again?

• What evidence did adults have that the girls
  were being truthful in their accusations?
• Why did Abigail want Elizabeth Proctor do die?
  What is Abigails motivation for lying about
  people being witches?

3
Essential Characteristics
Nonessential Characteristics

• Transforming information into insight
• Shifting the research process from collection to
  creation as a thinker works on developing
  something new
• Turns findings upside down and inside out to
  find some new possibilities

• Just looking at the information to learn it
• Just memorizing facts and numbers

Inventive Questions
Examples
Non-examples

• What does all this information mean?
• How does this story fit with others Ive read?
• How does this story fit into the historical
  context of that time period?

• I like this story because.
• Three things I learned from this are.
• There were 91 more people arrested.

4
Essential Characteristics
Nonessential Characteristics

• Explores the possibilities and tests
  relationships
• Emphasizes prediction
• Sharpens understanding of cause and effect

• Does not test theories or relationships
• No strategic planning or thinking
• Not problem-based learning

Hypothetical Questions
Examples
Non-examples

• If I were writing The Crucible, how would
• I improve it?
• If I were a judge, what other options would I
  have?
• What would I do if this happened in my community?

• Summarize Act IV.
• Describe the conflict between Abigail and John.
• Explain the connection between the Red Scare and
  the play The Crucible.

5
Essential Characteristics
Nonessential Characteristics

• Involves digging to the heart of the matter
• Is a life skill

Not surface questions Not a type of question
that will end with your education
Probing Questions
Examples
Non-examples

• If you were the main character in this story,
  what would be some questions you would want to
  ask?
• As the researcher, what are some questions you
  want to ask about your innovation?
• What kinds of questions should I ask in an
  interview that will reflect well on me?

• Hypothetical questions
• Irrelevant questions
• Irreverent questions
• Inventive questions

6
Essential Characteristics
Nonessential Characteristics

• Push against traditions
• Challenge routines
• Stimulates fresh thinking
• Throws conventional wisdom off balance

• Safe questions that dont challenge anything
• Simple recall questions

Provocative Questions
Examples
Non-examples

• Wheres the beef? content? The substance? The
  logic? The evidence?
• What is the source? Is the source reliable?
• Whats the point? Is there a point?
• Cutting past the noise and the rhetoric, is there
  any insight, knowledge or worthwhile information
  out there?

• How do you feel about this topic?
• What would you do in this situation?
• Hypothetical questions

7
Essential Characteristics
Nonessential Characteristics

• Uses existing knowledge as a base
• Healthy balance between order, logic, chaos,
  inspiration
• Moves logically from the core of conventional
  knowledge and experience

• brainstorming options
• Questions that challenge authority or thinking
• Hypothetical questions

Divergent Questions
Examples
Non-examples

• Has anyone tried this before?
• How did it work?
• Were they successful?
• What did they try?

• Questions that challenge routines or thinking
• Probing questions
• Irrelevant questions

8
Essential Characteristics
Nonessential Characteristics

• Can be considered and pondered
• Can build tentative, partial questions
• May never capture the exact and complete answer
  or truth

• Can be answered completely
• Reveals the truth

Unanswerable Questions
Examples
Non-examples

• Why does the rain fall?
• What happened to trust?
• What happened to the media?
• What does this poem mean?

• How many letters are in the alphabet?
• What are some of the major news networks?
• Who wrote this poem, and in what time period was
  it written in?

9
Essential Characteristics
Nonessential Characteristics

• Telling questions- sift and sort during gathering
  process
• Organizing- structures findings into categories
  to get meaning
• Clarifying-doing background rdg. to identify key
  concepts and phrases
• Sorting and sifting- pulling out the best
  information and organizing it
• Elaborating- extend and stretch the info we are
  finding
• Planning- developing a plan of action
• Strategic- focus on ways to make meaning

• Hypothetical questions
• Irrelevant questions
• Irreverent questions
• Inventive questions

Subsidiary Questions
Examples
Non-examples

• What kinds of innovation are out there?
• What are some types of innovations?
• What does innovation mean?
• How can I summarize this information?
• How can I take this farther?
• What does it mean?
• Which search tool will speed the discovery
  process?
• How can I best approach this next step? This next
  challenge? This next frustration?

Which innovation should I choose? Who
invented this innovation? What would the world
be like without this innovation?