To create engaging and effective training sessions, trainers must pay attention to various elements of classroom dynamics. One of these elements can be bucketed into the vast topic of questioning best practices. I believe that questioning best practices play a critical role in fostering productive conversations in the classroom. There’s one best practice in particular that I’d like to take a moment to ponder. That is the best practice of asking one question at a time. So here are a few of my current thoughts on the topic. 📚💡
We’ve all done it in our personal life or the classroom. We get excited or a little worked up, whatever the case; we fire off two, three, MAYBE four questions all at once. It might have been with a loved one, maybe in a meeting or a training class. The point is we ask more than one question at a time, and the result is always the same. We get one answer to one of the questions we asked, and we move on because, just like everyone else, we also forgot what the first question we asked was! 🙋♀️🙋♂️🌟
”I believe that questioning best practices play a critical role in fostering productive conversations in the classroom.
Jordon Taylor
I recently noticed that it isn’t just in our speech either! I saw it pop up on a training slide a few months ago! I was working with a company that offered me an opportunity to sit in on a process improvement training they were putting leaders through. In that training, there was a slide that had five different questions on it. After pulling up the slide, the presenter asked someone to think of an example of a current process and tell us about it by answering all five questions. Even with the questions written in front of them, we only got three out of five answered. 🤫🤔🗣️
To be clear, I can’t think of a single reason to put five questions on one slide. It wouldn’t even occur to me to try, but maybe some folks have gotten away with it. I would think you would have better luck asking the questions individually. Or, at a minimum, prompt them if you insist on keeping all five on one slide. Neither of these are great approaches, in my opinion. Use those presenters’ notes! That would be my recommendation, but moving on.
So why do we ask multiple questions at once? Some might say over-eagerness, others might say lack of awareness, and others might say, “Nobody told me not to.” Well, I am telling you now, especially in the classroom, you have to stop. All it takes is a little awareness and maybe some observational feedback. If you don’t have a friend or coworker that can provide you with observational feedback, use your cell phone. Maintain awareness of it and track progress through self-reflection and/or observational feedback; it will be a thing of the past in a couple of weeks. You’ll catch yourself doing it occasionally, but it won’t be as often. 🤝📝💪
As trainers, it’s our responsibility to create engaging and impactful sessions. After all, that’s why we get paid the big bucks! Start focusing on asking one question at a time and improve the likeliness you’ll get the answers you need to foster better conversations in the classroom. It’s such a small change with an easy fix, but it will noticeably impact your communication skills both in and out of training. Give it a crack, and let me know how it goes. Good luck!
