In this lesson snapshot, a high school ESL 4 class delves into factory farming, sustainability, and the food industry through Michael Pollan's book The Omnivore's Dilemma. They use the QFT twice throughout the unit; once as a pre-reading exercise and later to unpack two juxtaposed primary sources images of farming then and now, armed with knowledge from the book.
Teaching + Learning
The QFocus is often the most challenging part of designing a QFT lesson. It is also an essential piece to get right. Though it gets much easier with practice, there is always a bit of delicacy and iteration involved.
Explore resources to help spark student questions and learning--during Black History Month — and every month.
Using primary sources — photos, newspaper articles, letters, and so much more — in combination with the Question Formulation Technique can be a powerful way for students to ask questions about the past and think about the present. Black History Month is a good opportunity for students to explore primary sources through questions.
As a librarian, it’s in my wheelhouse to spend time searching for ‘what’s out there.’ The Library of
Congress is right there at the top of my go-to sites for anything historical, and especially for finding
primary sources to use with the Question Formulation Technique (QFT).
Reflection is the last step of the Question Formulation Technique, and it's an important one. Here, members of the Right Question Institute's team (Katy, Sarah, and Imaan) discuss some important things they've learned from students through those reflections.