The aim of this master's thesis is to address the topic of asking questions in class, which can
encourage student participation in the learning process. In addition to the teacher's questions,
we are also interested in students' questions. Although these questions represent one of the most
important ways of acquiring knowledge and developing critical thinking, they are often
overlooked.
In the theoretical part, we present the teacher's role in modern school in achieving the goals of
modern teaching, which are based on development of students' critical thinking, creativity and
their cooperation with one another. Accordingly, the teacher, as a "professional questioner",
must strive to ask the best possible questions at different levels as well as instruct students to
ask questions and thus encourage their activity and participation during the lesson. We also
define different classifications of teacher's questions and present them in more detail. We pay
particular attention to questions of higher and lower cognitive levels, which, according to
Bloom's taxonomy of learning objectives, can be divided into six different levels of complexity.
We dedicate one chapter to students' questions in class. We are interested in their significance,
in how they classify, as well as how important a positive and stimulating learning environment
is for the development and quality of asked questions.
In the empirical part, we present the results of a research where we determined the position of
teachers 'and students' questions during class in primary school. Through non-participant
observation and data analysis of ten lessons, we came to interesting findings. The research
showed that the teachers question's of a lower cognitive level still prevail and that the student's
questions in class are mostly organizational. Students also seemed to ask significantly fewer
substantive questions related to the learning content.
The analysis of ten lessons showed that teachers use different questioning strategies, however
most could create a relaxed atmosphere in the classroom and offer positive feedback to students.
An important finding of the research compared to previous research is that teachers now waited
longer for an answer after asking a question. This indicates the teacher's encouragement of
students to think and give a qualitative and critical answer to the question.
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