Inviting Diverse Participation: The Role of Student-Generated Questions in Classroom Collaborative Inquiry

Abstract

Using questioning and discussion techniques to drive instruction and meet the needs of diverse 
learners has been at the forefront of the current standards-based reform in the United States, where 
learning standards are used to determine academic expectations. The general goal of standardsbased education is to ensure that students are acquiring the knowledge and skills that are deemed to 
be essential for their success in higher education and careers (Great Schools Partnership, 2017). From
kindergarten to higher education, questioning has been viewed as a multifaceted strategy that 
animates learning, improves the quality of classroom instruction, and cultivates students’ higher order 
thinking (Conley, 2011; Danielson, 2011; McLaughlin & Overturf, 2012; Porter, McMaken, Hwang, & 
Yang, 2011). Given the importance attributed to the role of questioning in students’ academic and 
career success, how questions are incorporated into classroom teaching/learning practices to provide 
a well-structured, effective instruction for all learners, including English language learners (ELLs), 
deserves to be extensively studied. As a preliminary comparative study, this paper compares and 
contrasts Common Core Standards (CCSS) (CCSS, 2011) and Philosophy for Children (P4C) (Lipman, 
1991) classroom practices as two approaches to questioning, with a special focus on classroom roles
created for students in each approach. The goal is to demonstrate that opportunities afforded by 
different classroom roles have profound implications of equity and inclusion for ELLs in classroom 
inquiry communities.