Questions That Stimulate Complex Thinking
Questions invite different levels and complexity of thinking. Early in chil-
dren’s lives, they learn to be alert to certain syntax cues to know how to
behave or think. Teachers will want to use linguistic tools deliberately to
engage and challenge complex, creative thinking. The following vignette
by Oliver Wendell Holmes captures the levels of thinking at increasingly
complex levels:
The Three-Story Intellect
There are one-story intellects, two-story intellects, and three-story
intellects with skylights.
All fact collectors, who have no aim beyond their facts, are
one-story men.
Two-story men compare, reason, generalize, using the labors
of the fact collectors as well as their own.
Three-story men idealize, imagine, predict—their best illu-
mination comes from above, through the skylight. (Costa, 2001,
p. 361)Holmes reminds us that all three levels of thinking are important.
Te a c h e r s w i l l w a n t t o d e s i g n a n d p o s e qu e s t i o n s t h a t e l i c i t a l l t h r e e. T h e
graphic representation of Holmes’s story in Figure 8.1 can be used as a
mental map to help teachers pose questions. On the first story are the
data-gathering cognitive operations. On the second story we find cognitive
operations that help students make meaning of the data: the processing
level. The third story of the house invites students to go beyond the sky-
lights to speculate, elaborate, and apply concepts in new and hypotheti-
cal situations. In the following sections we offer examples of questions
that invite specific cognitive operations at each level of the three-story
intellect.
Data Gathering
Data-gathering questions are designed to draw from students the con-
cepts, information, feelings, or experiences acquired in the past and stored
in long- or short-term memory. These questions can also be designed to
138 Learning and Leading with Habits of Mind