Unit 2E: Questions and answers Section 3: SHORT FOCUSED TASKS
Objectives
Children should learn:
key idea: that some questions have only yes/no answers and have to be phrased carefully
Activities
Outcomes
Children:
Construct a paper-based binary tree using a set of objects such as fruit. Prepare some strips of paper for recording the questions. Cut a set of red arrows for 'no' answers and green arrows for 'yes' answers. Collect a set of fruit, such as banana, apple, apricot, grapefruit, grape. Select two of these pieces of fruit, eg the banana and apple. Ask a question to distinguish between them (the answers can be yes or no), eg Is it yellow? Put down a red and a green arrow leading from the question strip. Put the banana at the end of the green (yes) arrow and the apple at the end of the red (no) arrow. Now choose another piece of fruit such as a grape. Ask the first question again. This time the answer will be 'no'. Follow the 'no' arrow and construct a question to distinguish between the apple and the grape. The question might be Is it small? Position this question strip at the end of the red arrow with a red and green arrow leading from it. The apple should follow the red 'no' arrow and the grape should follow the green 'yes' arrow. Repeat this process with each piece of fruit in turn.
Use a commercially prepared file on a binary tree database to replicate this activity or create your own on an appropriate topic. Ideally, there will be relevant artefacts or visual aids available for children to handle so that this is a concrete activity. Children should select one artefact from the set and use the software to identify it. They should then select a second artefact and follow the question and answer sequence in order to identify it. Repeat this until all of the artefacts are named. Attribute blocks or 3D shapes might be appropriate.
use a prepared file to identify objects
know that the program constructs a 'binary tree'
Points to note
In these activities the focus is not on the software, the rules that it uses to produce the answers or the context. The main focus is on the development and practice of questioning techniques.
The main focus of this activity is to practise asking questions using a simple search tool and to reinforce the idea that questions can be asked in several ways and, similarly, answers can be found in different ways.
This unit is divided into sections. Each section contains a sequence of
activities with related objectives and outcomes. You can view this unit by
moving through the sections or print/download the whole unit.
