Karen Glass On The Art of Asking Questions

Episode Overview

• Educator Karen Glass joins the hosts to discuss "The Art of Asking Questions," exploring how inquiry-based learning shapes a student's entire educational experience.
• The conversation contrasts relational, principle-based educational methods like narration and Socratic questioning with transactional, fact-based approaches like quizzing and the SRA program.
• The episode critiques modern test-centric "reading strategies," arguing they interfere with a student's ability to form a genuine connection with texts and authors.
• It emphasizes the foundational importance of establishing a clear philosophy of education before selecting any curriculum or teaching method.

Key Concepts

• The Art of Asking Questions: The central theme that the question itself is often more valuable than the answer, serving as the primary tool for genuine learning and discovery.
• Principle-Based Education: An approach, inspired by Charlotte Mason, where core principles about learning and humanity guide all teaching practices and curriculum choices.
• Relational vs. Transactional Learning: A key contrast between educational methods that foster a personal relationship with knowledge (like narration) and those focused on mere information retrieval (like fact-based quizzes or the SRA program).
• Critique of Modern Educational Models: An analysis of how test-driven approaches, "reading strategies," and programs like SRA can create unhealthy competition, stress, and a dislike for reading by turning it into a task of hunting for answers.
• Socratic Method: A questioning technique defined as "playing dumb," where the teacher feigns ignorance to guide the student's discovery process, including its practical application in "Socratic narration."
• The Power of Questions to Shape Mindset: The concept that the type of question asked establishes a student's long-term mental posture toward learning, either fostering wonder and exploration or instilling doubt and antagonism.
• Philosophy Before Method: The argument that an educator must first establish a coherent philosophy of education before selecting any curricula or specific teaching techniques.

Quotes

• At 0:08 - "Welcome to Classical Education, a podcast for those who believe in rediscovering the art of asking questions, engaging in conversation, and attending to the ideas at the heart of well-ordered teaching and learning." - This quote from the podcast's introduction establishes its core mission and focus on inquiry and dialogue.
• At 2:03 - "It also is a book that really strikes at the heart of something that is very important to me... which is the importance of leading with principles and allowing those principles to inform our actions as teachers and really just as human beings." - Trey Bailey highlights the central theme he derived from Karen Glass's book "In Vital Harmony," which emphasizes principle-based living and teaching.
• At 4:03 - "Sometimes the question is more important than the answer." - Karen Glass introduces a foundational concept for the discussion, explaining a belief she has long held about the primary value of the question itself in the learning process.
• At 8:00 - "A Socratic question is almost a question that arises out of playing dumb." - Karen Glass offers a simple, accessible definition of a Socratic question, describing it as a method where the teacher feigns ignorance to guide the student to discover knowledge for themselves.
• At 28:17 - "I think it creates some unnecessary and unhealthy types of competition in the classroom related to reading." - Trey Bailey criticizes the SRA program for its public ranking system (e.g., students knowing each other's color-coded reading level), which can be demotivating.
• At 29:36 - "The one who most consistently wanted to ask questions about which answer was correct was the young man that I had who had grown up with a Charlotte Mason homeschool education... He was always coming to me and saying, 'Mr. Bailey, I think this is wrong.'" - Trey Bailey shares an anecdote contrasting the formulaic SRA system with the critical thinking developed through a Charlotte Mason education.
• At 31:26 - "The very fact that a child is looking at questions about a text like that before they read the text interferes with their relationship with what they're reading. It interferes with the connection between the author and the reader." - Karen Glass argues against the common "reading strategy" of previewing comprehension questions, explaining that it turns reading into a task of information retrieval.
• At 33:42 - "If you define education as being able to test well, you've misdefined it, as far as I'm concerned." - Karen Glass challenges the modern, test-driven approach to education, suggesting it misses the true purpose of learning.
• At 35:16 - "You shouldn't buy any curriculum until you know what your philosophy of education is... I was like, what is a philosophy of education?" - Lisa Cadora recalls being enlightened by a veteran homeschooler's advice, realizing that every educational method is built on an underlying philosophy.
• At 38:06 - "The kind of questions that we ask create a mental posture... That particular question is making you doubt reality, doubt truth." - Karen Glass uses a biblical example to illustrate how questions can be designed to instill either a posture of doubt or one of wonder and exploration.
• At 47:38 - "'Well, tell me more about what a countryman is. What does the text tell us that makes you think he was a countryman?' And he was able to narrate the whole rest of the chapter." - Lisa Cadora gives a practical example of "Socratic narration," where asking a student for textual evidence unlocked a much more detailed and comprehensive narration.

Takeaways

• Prioritize developing a clear educational philosophy before choosing any curriculum or teaching method.
• Frame questions to foster wonder and genuine inquiry rather than simply to test for factual recall.
• Use methods like narration and Socratic dialogue to help students build a personal relationship with subjects, not just memorize facts about them.
• Avoid teaching students to "hunt for answers" by previewing questions; instead, encourage them to first engage directly and thoughtfully with the author's ideas.
• Practice "playing dumb" by asking guiding questions that empower students to discover answers and connections for themselves.
• Measure educational success by a student's love of learning and critical thinking ability, not solely by their performance on tests.