The Right Question Institute’s Sarah Westbrook joined the Learning Vibes Podcast on the show’s November episode, speaking to Kimberly Douglas about the value of questioning.
Their conversation touched on a number of topics, including the idea of questioning being an important “survival skill” for people to be able to navigate the unknown.
Among other things, the two spoke about the power dynamics that are often just under the surface when it comes to asking questions, the different practices around questioning in different cultures, and the ways in which questioning can help create an equal playing field for all stakeholders in a school setting.
They also discussed the spectrum of questioning that exists, from the spontaneous questions that often pop into our heads to the more deliberate questions we spend time crafting.
“There’s a misnomer that questioning is something that any 3- or 4-year-old can do,” Westbrook said. “Three and 4-year-olds are prolific questioners. They’re asking hundreds of questions a day, tens of thousands of questions a year, and so there’s almost this belief that it’s like breathing. But what you’re doing when you intentionally ask a question as an adult, and you’re trying to formulate it to get at information, and you’re trying to be strategic about the language you use — it’s sort of a whole different ball game.”
In connection to the power dynamics around questioning, “Sometimes what happens is that the person with power, or the person with knowledge, or the person with expertise is the one who gets to ask questions,” Westbrook said.
“When you want to ask a question, sometimes you have to break a social norm or a social script in order to do that,” she said. “You have to assert power in a situation where you might not otherwise feel powerful. So that’s difficult.”
You can listen to the whole podcast episode at the Learning Vibes Podcast website. Scroll to the episode, “The Power of Questioning: A Conversation with Sarah Westbrook of the Right Question Institute.”