Thinking Through Questions: A Concise Invitation To Critical, Expansive, And Philosophical Inquiry

Description

Thinking Through Questions is an accessible and compact guide to the art of questioning, covering both the use and abuse of questions. Animated by wide-ranging and engaging exercises and examples, the book helps students deepen their understanding of how questions work and what questions do, and builds the skills needed to ask better questions. Cowritten by two of today's leading philosopher-teachers, Thinking Through Questions is specifically designed to complement, connect, and motivate today's standard curricula, especially for classes in critical thinking, philosophical questioning, and creative problem- solving (called here "expansive questioning"). Offering students a wide and appreciative look at questions and questioning, this small book will also appeal to faculty and students across the disciplines: in college writing courses, creativity workshops, education schools, introductions to college thinking, design thinking projects, and humanities and thinking classes. Open-ended, creative, and critically self-possessed thinking is its constant theme—what field doesn’t need more of that? Front cover......Page 1 Half title page......Page 2 Title page......Page 4 Copyright......Page 5 Dedication......Page 6 Contents......Page 8 Preface......Page 10 What Is a Question?......Page 14 What Is the Use of Questions?......Page 16 Why Study Questions?......Page 21 For Practice......Page 25 Clarify Intentions......Page 33 Clarify Terms......Page 35 Take Your Time......Page 36 Entertain More Than One Answer......Page 38 Persist......Page 40 Take Courage......Page 42 For Practice......Page 44 Questioning Sources......Page 50 Questioning Generalizations......Page 55 Questioning Explanations......Page 59 For Practice......Page 62 Exploratory Questioning......Page 70 Generative Questioning......Page 72 Long-Lever Questions......Page 77 For Practice......Page 80 Questioning Assumptions......Page 89 Questioning Meanings......Page 91 Big-Picture Questioning......Page 94 For Picture......Page 99 Interlude: Zen Questions......Page 106 Loaded Questions......Page 109 Power Plays......Page 113 Dealing with Questionable Questions......Page 118 For Practice......Page 124 Two Kinds of Classes......Page 131 Thinking Through Questions in Question-Answering Classes......Page 136 Thinking Through Questions in Questioning-Centered Classes......Page 140 For Practice......Page 143 For Further Practice......Page 147 For Teachers......Page 151 About the Authors......Page 156 Visual Thinking Space......Page 159 Back cover......Page 162