Don’t just list examples of writing techniques. Let’s improve Shakespeare!

I stopped and started with “What 👄 special writing techniques does the author use? List examples.”

Taking A Zoologist Across Disciplines

All I did was ask students to list and explain three “disciplines.” Let’s take it a bit further!

My class listed two Unanswered Questions. Now what?

It seems obvious, but if someone tells me what they’re wondering about, I shouldn’t move on to another topic!

Going Beyond “Define These Terms In Your Own Words”

“Define these terms in your own words” may contain depth and complexity… but it’s neither deep nor complex!

Multiple Perspectives Gone Mad!!

Yes, I actually gave my students this question: “How could two experts’ 👓 perspectives regarding information from this reading selection differ from one another?” yikes.

Beyond “Describe How This Changed Over Time”

I want to go beyond just listing how a character changed. Let’s get students thinking about that change!

Don’t Just List ⚖️ Ethical Issues

Let’s improve this “make a list” question to incorporate high level thinking.

Improving “What’s The Chapter’s 🏛️ Big Idea?”

Let’s improve this bland Depth and Complexity question by getting really specific.

I just asked, “Do You Notice Any Patterns?”

Here’s another question from a worksheet I used to use: Do you notice any 🌀 patterns in this book? And then the next question moved on to another topic. Do you notice any 🌀 patterns in this book? Were there any ⚖️ ethical issues? What was the 🏛️ big idea? I was leaving so much […]

Fixing my “Think Like A Statistician” Frame

I used a Depth and Complexity Frame like this with my math students. Let’s look at how we could improve this. Some problems: It asks four unrelated questions. I want to build a sequence of questions that climbs Bloom’s Taxonomy. Most of the questions are naturally answered with “yes” or “no” or a list. Questions […]