What key questions do you want your students to consider?

29/04/08 12:30 Filed in: Worldview education | Questions
You can help your students develop a Christian worldview by asking questions. What key questions do you want your students to consider?

Here are some of the questions teachers at Christian Academy in Japan want to ask their students:
  1. What’s true?
  2. What's real?
  3. What is best?
  4. Who are you?
  5. Where are we going?
  6. What’s wrong with the world?
  7. What do you believe in?
  8. What basic assumptions about life do you have?
  9. How does learning a new language change your worldview and your relationship with God?
  10. What difference does Jesus make?
  11. How do math truths reflect God's character?
  12. What patterns from math can be found in creation?
  13. How do authors help you see truth?
  14. How do you make a difference?
  15. What is the connection?
  16. How should you use you words?
  17. Why do we study math?
Real question: The real question isn’t “What key questions do you want your students to consider?” The real question is “What questions will you ask your students?”

Ask your students a question. Today.

*To take an online tutorial on using questions, click here.


Why do CAJ teachers want to ask their students questions?
  1. The supreme value of almost any question is that it invites a person to think, especially about eternal things. How do we invite our students to think about God and what matters to Him? By asking them the sort of question that will invite them to think.
  2. Asking questions helps students to focus and make connections…. Questions encourage the students to do some reflection and articulate what they are thinking. I want the students to think beyond themselves and consider others. I want students to begin to develop a Christian worldview that they will continue to refine and articulate as they grow and mature.
  3. The big questions for World Literature are “Who am I?”, “Who is my neighbor?”, “What’s wrong with the world?”, and “What is the significance of words?” I want my students to answer these because I believe nearly everything ever written has been, to a certain extent, in response to one of these questions, especially one of the first 3. I want them to see by this that humans are at root spiritual beings, seeking meaning.
  4. I would want my students to reflect on how they are changing and how they are being influenced when learning a new language. I want the learning to be intentional and I want them to see the difference between who they were and who they have become as they are learning a new language.
  5. I want my students to consider the question, “What difference does Jesus make?” This question provides a window into both theology proper (thinking about who God is as He has revealed Himself to us in Christ) and into our ways of relating to everything else (e.g., because of Christ, we are not responsible for fashioning and accomplishing our own salvation; we do not need to seek vengeance; loving enemies can be more than a nice idea, etc.).
  6. In order to broaden students' perspectives about different worldviews and to articulate their own, they need to understand which truths are the basis for their own worldview. One question I've been asking, and will continue to ask, is "What is truth?" followed by "How do authors help me see truth?" These questions not only got my students talking more, but also got my students thinking about how literature relates to them directly.
  7. I use questions to open a dialogue. Some questions are pretty closed: What's 2 + 2? Others are open: What's real? So the questions I ask will range from simple closed questions (or even more complex closed questions) to open-ended questions that get at a worldview. A question for tomorrow: How does the study of shapes in geometry inform you about the world?