Teacher Questioning as a Formative Assessment Strategy in EFL Context

Existing studies on classroom questioning tend to focus on exploring effective teacher’s questioning in classroom learning and finding the relationship between questioning behavior and students outcomes, however, there has been scarce research on teacher questioning as a formative assessment strategy. It investigated how teachers deployed questions to stimulate student thinking, uncover students’ current level of learning, and allow responses to inform pedagogic decisions. The research method was classroom observations. This article highlights the practice of one experienced teacher who conducted quality questioning to gauge and facilitate learning. Low level questions were dominantly used to ask specific knowledge. Meanwhile, high level questions were rarely asked to probe students’ understanding. No answer response was the highest proportion among other response given by the students. It also provides practical insights into how questioning can be developed as a formative assessment method and recommends equipping teachers with further knowledge and skills to carry out effective questioning.


INTRODUCTION
Evidence is mounting that formative assessment is generally acknowledged as a tool which teachers use to give feedback to students and/or guide their instruction.Its formative function has received steady consideration since Black and Wiliam's (1998) influential work demonstrated that formative assessment can be a powerful way to enhance student learning in general education contexts.In English language education, however, there has been relatively few empirical investigations of formative assessment in the classroom (Carless, 2011;Jiang, 2014).
In classroom interaction, e.g, teacher questioning is defined as instructional cues or stimuli that enables students to convey the material to be learned and directions for what they should do and how they should do it.Theoretically, it is believed that they can assist students to convey students' review, to check on comprehension, to stimulate critical thinking, to encourage creativity, to emphasize a point, to control classroom activities, to help determines grade, and to encourage discussion (Erdogan & Campbell, 2008;Tracy & Robbles, 2009;Wong,R, 2010;Ghoorchaei, et al., 2010;Roostini, 2011;Cho & Park, 2014;Kawalkar & Vijapurkar, 2013;Smart & Marshall, 2012;Sardareh & Sa"ad, 2013;Jiang, 2014;Boyd, 2015;Chen, Hand & Meier, 2016).Whereas, questioning, with specific reference to its use as an assessment tool, has remained relatively underexplored.
Regarding to questioning as an assessment tool, Jiang (2014) in his study focused on three stages which occurred in classroom teacher questioning; initiation, response and evaluation stage.Particularly, in the initiation stage, convergent questions can be used to facilitate student mastery of the knowledge, and divergent questions have the potential to engage learners in deep thinking.In the response stage, convergent questions expose learners' to be actively participate in classroom questioning.In the evaluation stage, a lack of student responses can be utilized to inspire independent and collaborative learning.another study which conducted by Tan (2007) revealed that teacher dominantly used low level questions to engage students' learning.In contrast, the high level of questions were rarely used to stimulate students' thinking.
In accordance, this present study explored teacher questioning as an assessment strategy.Particularly, this paper is drawn from investigating the classroom questioning of one EFL teacher in university level.For the purpose of illustrating how teacher questions might be used to gauge and promote learning, this study sketches on three -part sequence; Initiation, Response and Feedback (IRF) by Sinclair and Coulthard (1975) in which the teacher asks a question, the student gives an answer, and the teacher makes a comment.This study aimed to examine the entire process of questioning and check whether each stage fulfilled its learning function.Therefore, this present study tries to investigate the answer of the following research questions: 1. What types of questions are posed by the teachers and to what extent do they seem to benefit learning?2. What types of responses are elicited by teacher questions and do they represent student thinking?
3. What actions are taken by the teachers upon receiving responses and to what extent do they appear to promote learning?

LITERATURE REVIEW
The framework of this study draws on findings from the fields of formative assessment and EFL classroom interaction.This section clarifies the relationship between formative assessment and classroom teaching and reviews studies on questioning from both areas.

Formative Assessment and EFL Classroom Interaction
Formative assessment is a term open to different interpretations.According to Black and Wiliam (2009), assessment is formative when 'evidence about student achievement is elicited, interpreted, and used by teachers, learners, or their peers, to make decisions about the next steps in instruction that are likely to be better, or better founded, than the decisions they would have taken in the absence of the evidence that was elicited ' (2009: 9).Seen in this light, the priority of formative assessment is to enhance instruction or/and promote learning by following the procedure of eliciting, interpreting, and using evidence.
Formative assessment takes various forms and may be plotted at different points along a more "formal" to "informal" continuum (Rea-Dickins, 2001: 437).That is, both formal preplanned tasks such as classroom quizzes and informal ad hoc activities like teacher questioning can be seen as different versions of formative assessment.
Researchers generally agree that formative assessment and classroom teaching are interrelated.Rea-Dickins (2001) asserts that assessment strategies, especially informal ones, are routinely embedded within good classroom practice.Carless (2011) echoes this view by illustrating key assessment strategies reflecting characteristics of good teaching.In addition, Leung (2005) points out that formative assessment occurs spontaneously during ordinary instruction even if teachers may consider themselves to be teaching rather than assessing.
It can be inferred from the above that, formative assessment is an inseparable part of effective teaching: the two share the same goal of enhancing learning.Despite the similarities, formative assessment requires the teacher to seek, interpret, and use evidence about student learning, whereas good teaching does not necessarily follow this procedure.

Questioning as a Formative Assessment Strategy
Question is widely accepted to play a vital role in second language classroom.Basically, questions is used as a device by which teacher could evaluate the specific purposes of learning.However, It is worth noting that questioning may not be an assessment tool in all situations (Jiang, 2014).For example, when it is adopted to develop student interest rather than to check learning, questioning is a teaching technique and not an assessment tool.Another example is that even when questioning is aimed at diagnosing learning, if follow-up actions are not taken to facilitate learning, it would be inapposite to label it as a formative assessment strategy.
In relation to classroom questioning, It has a typical sequence: -teacher initiation, student response, and teacher feedback (IRF) (Sinclair and Coulthard, 1975).In this sense, to develop questioning as a formative assessment tool, there is a need to go beyond the standard IRF.First, the questions posed should be critical to the development of students' understanding (Black et al., 2003).Second, the responses elicited should represent student thinking to facilitate teachers' subsequent decision making.Third, the follow-up actions teachers take should be meaningful interventions which move learners towards their learning goals (Hill and McNamara, 2012).In brief, to explore questioning as an assessment tool, we need to examine the entire process of questioning and make sure that each stage serves the learning purpose.

Past Studies on Teacher Questioning in EFL Classroom
It is therefore, not surprisingly that so much research has been paid to teacher question.In the formative assessment area, for instance, Black, Harrison, Lee, Marshall, and Wiliam (2003) have demonstrated how questioning can be used as an assessment strategy in content classrooms.They spend their much time on framing quality questions, group discussions conducted to allow deep thinking, and rich follow-up activities created further learning opportunities.Particularly, in relation to teacher feedback, it is believed that questioning could scaffold development and learning in teacher training feedback sessions, Engin (2012).Differently, in Australia EFL context, Kira et al (2013) investigated the extent to which teachers' questioning techniques and the way teachers handled students' responses facilitated students' learning and promoted their thinking skills.The findings showed that 80% of the observed teachers had a moderate ability in using questioning techniques to measure students' understanding.The interesting observation in all schools was that teachers interacted frequently with active students and bothered less to involve the least active ones.Moreover, above 80% of all teachers had problems of promoting students' thinking by maintaining a balance between the open-ended and closeended questions or between convergent and divergent questions.The teachers indicated severe weaknesses in guiding classroom discussions through effective questioning as their abilities in probing were low.Other researchers (e.g.Tan, 2007;Cakmak, 2009;Fisher, 2009 ;Wong,R, 2010;Kawalkar & Vijapurkar, 2011;Smart & Marshall, 2012;Sardareh & Sa"ad, 2013) have confirmed findings by Black et al., (2003) that quality questioning makes both teaching and learning more effective.

RESEARCH METHOD 3.1 Participants
The study was conducted in one State University in Indonesia.A teacher and one speaking IV class in fourth semester were chosen as research subject.A purposeful sampling helped select teachers skillful in questioning.She was chosen under consideration that she was one of senior teachers who has been teaching for about 6 years.She also frequently talks more in her class.It can be seen on the way she teaches in her classroom, she explains more or very often gives tutorial to the students.

Data Collection
Classroom observations were conducted to obtain firsthand information about teacher questioning practices.Particularly, a non-participant observer was chosen to record notes without becoming involved in the activities of the participants.Clearly, the data has taken in the form of utterances.Video-recording was also made to capture teacher questions, student responses, and teacher reactions to these responses.Purposefully, the non-participant observation has occasionally conducted for about four meeting on a consecutive basis, which yielded about six hours of data.

Data Analysis
Generally, Observational data were analyzed by going through the video recording, sorting out episodes involving question-answer interaction and transcribing the interactions verbatim.Particularly, the data has been analyzed through some procedures proposed by Miles and Huberman (1994:10-12).The procedure consists of three current flows activity: data reduction, data display, and conclusion drawing/verification.In particular, some steps have been conducted in analyzing the data which cover the following activities.(1) Aggregating the data gathered, involving all of the information from the field.In this case, the data obtained were processed by transcribing the teacher's utterances gained by the result of video recording during the speaking IV class was conducted.(2) Classifying the data gained by the result of recording transcription.Those were classified in terms of types of teacher questioning and teacher follow-up actions to student responses were each coded according to Richards and Lockhart's (1994) typology and Hattie and Timperley's (2007) classification system.(3) Displaying the data which has been selected and simplified in order to make it clearer and easier to be interpreted.(4) Interpreting the data which analyzed descriptively.(5) Validating the data, the results of data analysis from transcription were crosschecked out with other participant to validate the findings; (6) Reporting the result, making the conclusion, which were derived in regard with the result of findings and discussions to answer research questions.

FINDINGS
The findings of this study covers the overview of teaching learning process in speaking IV class and the data in classroom questioning under the investigation.Table 1 and Table 2 below provide definitions and examples of different question types and response types to give readers a flavor of the categorization.Table 3 shows the average number of questions that the teachers raised in each session and Table 4 presents how these questions were answered.
The results of data analysis found that teacher most frequently were convergent questions (47%), procedural questions (43%), and divergent questions (10%).The largest proportion of these questions lead to students responding with individual answer (56%), and students choral answer (31%).A small proportion responded with proportion with no answer (9%) and teacher answer (4%).

1. Teacher Questions and the Extent to Which They Benefit Learning
The results of data analysis revealed that there are three types of questioning, which the teacher has used in her classroom.They are procedural, convergent and divergent.There are totally 246 extracts of four meeting class on teacher's questioning strategies.The finding shows that it has different frequency of the presence.From those three types of questioning found that convergent questions were more frequently than divergent and procedural questions.The first two categories will further examine.Seen in this light, these closely relate to the content of learning.Note.T=Teacher; S 1 =One student; Ss=Students as a group/whole class.

Convergent Question.
Generally, the classroom data revealed that the use of low level of questions such as, recall, and comprehension were frequently required in Convergent question.Merely, it is required student to recognize or recall information.The student is not asked to manipulate information, but merely to remember previously learned material or a factual observation.Indeed, the teacher used this questions under expectation that her students tell when, who, where and how they are using their knowledge.The following situation has shown teacher deployed convergent question to ask about students' knowledge.
T : 'Have you ever heard case building?What is it?' (Meeting 2) -raised after the teacher explaining some terms in debating T : 'What does it mean by roles of the speaker?Can you mention it?'(Meeting 3) -raised when the teacher asked students a week before to find out the information related to the roles of the speaker.
Those convergent questions are considered as the lowest level.Both extract indicates that the teacher only asks the students about the specific knowledge.Solely, this kind of question only requires short answer.Indeed, it is implied that the teacher intends to ask further question like clarifying the student to mention what it is, and to elicit the answers in which the teacher already knew and expected.
Another convergent questions found that the students required to apply their previously learned knowledge to reach an answer to a problem.The following extracts described the use of convergent question in which the teacher has previously taught the students about any terms in debate and defining a clear motion.

T
: 'What about VOI?What information do you get?' (Meeting 2) -raised after the teacher showed a video, and asked them to find information dealing with VOI T : 'How about defining the motion?does it reflect the background?' (Meeting 3) -raised after one of the student presented their defining and background of the motion.
Those two extracts are inferred that convergent questions require the students to apply their previous knowledge to come up with the answer expected by the teacher.Therefore, the teacher also gets the benefit of it, as like the teacher could clarify whether or not the students has already understood about the previous knowledge they learned.

Divergent Question.
It is frequently used by the teacher when the teacher wants to probe initial student answer.In this case, the teacher requires the students to think critically and in depth.They also have to break something into its constituent parts.They are asked to organize, to clarify, to identify reasons, uncover evidence and reach conclusion.This process of analysis helps the students understand "big ideas" and the relationship of parts.

T
: 'What do you think? is it clearly answer? is it very surgery really deep in Madura?' (Meeting 4) -raised when the teacher asked the student to give comment on particular student's presentation in defining the motion and making a background related to cosmetic surgery should be banned.T : 'ok, what do you think guys?Kalo ini ngomongin sosial burdened nya ya yang err people to do cosmetic surgery than you talk about there are a lot of effect for example long term effect of plastic surgery is failed dan akan semakin membuat broken.What do you think?Is it background or already arguments?'(Meeting4) -raised when the teacher commented on one of students presentation.Then invited others to give comments.
From the above extracts, it was found that the teacher asked the students to give their opinion toward issue related to cosmetic surgery.Here, the teacher provided example of the evidence to make it clear to students.It implied that the teacher gave a chance to freely judge whether it belongs to background or argument.Commonly, the teacher asks by using yes no question instead of requiring a short answer, these questions indirectly require the students to give a long answer in which they have to give a judgment, then followed by some evidences to support their judgment.
In brief the finding showed the evidence that both convergent and divergent questions could benefit students' learning.First, the convergent questions engaged learner to recall and apply their previous knowledge in acquiring teacher-expected answer.Second, divergent questions were used by the teacher to encourage the students to elicit their higher level of thinking by giving their personal opinion on certain issue.In this sense, the teacher questioning also benefit the teacher to know what students' need.Hence, the teacher could make a pedagogical decision for better classroom practice accordingly.

Students Response
The classroom data reveled that students responding toward the teacher question were involved individual answer (56%), students choral answer (31%), no answer (9%) and teacher answer (4%).The following analysis focuses on individual answer and no answer.

Individual Answer.
The result of classroom observation revealed that the students response with individual answer from time to time.Mainly, the teacher asked the students to read provided reference dealing with the topic being discussed in the following week.Then they teacher will ask the students the information they get from their reading.As it is seen in Meeting 2. It seems that the teacher's purpose in requiring individual answers was understood by the students; students were expected to think about the question, be prepared to give an answer, and be actively involved in the question-answer interaction.
Further analysis revealed an interesting finding: it occured when students discussed about the difference between debate and discussion.They were exchanging ideas, as it is seen in the following.: And to respect to other opinion Note.T=Teacher; Ss=Students as a group/whole class; S 1 =One student; S 2 = another one student.
Those revealed that the student is required to judge the merits of idea and offer different opinion on an issue.They also have to give the defensible opinions with criteria for their judgment.In this case, it is implied that students thinking were elicited to argue on certain issue.

No Answer.
Out of 226 teacher questions, 9 elicited no responses; a further analysis revealed that most of these unanswered questions were convergent and very few was divergent.Since convergent questions simply required factual recall and were assumed to be easier to answer.However, students repeatedly fail to offer answers as it is seen in meeting 2. T : Good.And then the government side.At this one opening and closing , and then in the opposition side there will opening opposition and closing oppposition , nah to make it clear, i'm going to show you the video.And then another term that you will hear is Case building.Anyone knows about this one?Have you ever heard case building?Ss : (Silent) Note.T=Teacher; Ss=Students as a group/whole class Those indicated that the teacher asked certain term related to the debate.However, the term seemed strange for students.Accordingly, a lack of knowledge was probably the reason for the silence.In addition, different questions which was asked at the same time, it could confuse students which questions they have to answer.Perhaps the teacher question was aimed to inform students of her expectation dealing with new term.
Another analysis also revealed that students tend to response with no answer toward divergent question.The extracts above described when one of the students had presented his work, then the teacher asked students' opinion dealing with their friend's work.It seemed that the teacher's divergent questions hard for students to respond, although the lecturer had translated into Indonesian.Probably, in this sense, students lack of knowledge dealing with background and arguments, or perhaps lack of waiting time, the length of question and asking different questions at the same time also cause the students to be silent.To sum up the findings, the individual response generally required students to think actively and participate in classroom interaction.In that way, the teacher will get various different responses to each individual answer.In contrast to individual response, students responded with no answer, has limited the students to give their opinion on certain issue.Therefore, teacher reaction toward no answer students was needed to minimize students passively involve in classroom questioning.

Teacher Actions
Teacher actions in this case referred to teacher feedback in responding to individual response and no answer.

Reaction to individual answer.
There were two mainly teacher strategies used to respond to individual answer; probing and redirecting her questions.Teacher probed her question when the initial student answers may be superficial.Then the teacher encouraged them to think more deeply to the answer of the previous questions.In that way, teacher probed the individual response by asking the student explanatory question to explore initial comment, as it is occurred in meeting 4. T : The extract above described that the teacher initiates a question and direct it to the whole class.As consequent, one of the students answered it.However, her answer was superficial.In that case, the teacher needed to probes toward individual response.
Other strategy which frequently used by the teacher in responding to individual answer is redirecting.Commonly, it occurs when there is a student gets stuck on an initial question, the teacher will ask another student or the whole class to give a response on that question.As it occured in meeting 3. The extract described the teacher asked one of students to answer the questions.However she got stuck, could not give any further comments.Officially, to get more information, the teacher redirected the questions to other students.She allowed other students to give any additional information.In other word, the teacher was highly appreciated toward the diverse ideas by accepting student ideas by writing in the whiteboard.Then, she perceived the weakness in responses (answers were similar and lacked critical thinking) by repeatedly calling for different ideas.And third, third he guided students to explore the question in depth by asking students to think critically.

4.3.2
Reaction to no answer.In relation to this, the teacher, merely, gave a very short response without any enough prompting to get the students to acquire the expected answer.She, finally gave further explanation toward student response with no answer.As it occurred in meeting 2. The above extract indicated that students respond with no answer.They are only silent.Perhaps, it occurs because the teacher's question seems strange for them.Their lack of knowledge and lack of teacher prompting limit them to respond to teacher questions.
To summarize the above findings, the teacher reactions to individual response tended to exert a positive impact on the students.First, by largely accepting students' answer, and being open to the diverse ideas, the teacher could establish non threatening classroom interaction and minimize of students' making mistake.Second, by probing and redirecting the questions, the teacher could guide the students into the expected answer.In that way, this type of questioning strategies could promote students' thinking.

DISCUSSION
This study explored teacher questioning as a formative assessment strategy.In accord with the research questions, it was found that teacher raised significantly more convergent questions (47%), procedural questions (43%), and divergent questions (10%).The majority of teacher questions elicited individual response (56%), students choral answer (31%).Meanwhile, the small proportion responded with proportion with no answer (9%) and teacher answer (4%).In general, the classroom observation revealed that the use of convergent and divergent could benefit students' learning.Convergent questions, for instance, were used by the teacher to ask the students about the specific knowledge dealing with when, who, where and how they are using their knowledge.Solely, this kind of question only requires short answer.Indeed, it is implied that the teacher intends to ask further question like clarifying the student to mention what it is, and to elicit the answers in which the teacher already knew and expected.While, divergent questions were used to engage the students higher -order thinking in which the teacher opened a chance for students to uncover evidence in relation to support their argument and also to give their judgment on certain issue.In regarding to students response, probing and redirecting questions to students will lead them to get more in depth information which could lead them to get the acquired answer.
The findings of the current study are similar to the results of Tan (2007) and Jiang (2014) study that high proportion of questions (90%) were at low level of question.However, Unlike Tan (2007), this finding is slightly similar to Jiang (2014) in regarding to the use of recall question which mainly focused on specific knowledge and that knowledge further apply to develop their arguments in giving and asking opinion on certain issue in debating.In addition, the finding also similar to Jiang (2014) but unlike Tan (2007), that higher cognitive questions were rarely asked.It was frequently aimed to engage learners in deep learning and to form students' critical viewpoints.
Regarding teacher's reactions toward student individual response in this study also differed from the finding revealed by Jiang (2014).For instance, probing and redirecting strategies were used to encourage individual student to become actively involves in classroom interaction and get students a deep understanding related to certain knowledge.The teacher did not ask the students to work in group to engage students' individual response as Jiang (2014) found.In a matter of teacher reaction toward no answer, this study also different from Jiang (2014), that the teacher almost ignored to no answer response, and likely answered their own questions.Perhaps, the questions deployed by the teacher was considered as higher level of thinking, and the students did not have enough time to think and get the expected answer (Wragg and Brown, 2001).The teacher did not give a certain task in which attempt the students to find the acquired answer by themselves.However, in term of, respecting to the diverse ideas by the students, both Jiang (2014) and this present study remain the same, they cared more about how students arrived at the answer and led students to explore the questions in depth.
From the points above, there is one interestingly point which reveals that the students very often give response with no answer.Occasionally, it happens when teacher deployed a long question, which is containing more than one type of questions at the same time.Consequently, teacher self reflecting toward his / her question deployed in the classroom becomes a basic necessity to make a pedagogical decision for a better classroom interaction.In that way, teacher perhaps knows how to react appropriately toward students' response, especially with no answer.Teacher, then, could emphasize on his / her questioning strategy on how they could encourage their students' to think to the acquire answer, and to encourage them to become actively involves in classroom questioning.

CONCLUSION
The exploration of teacher questioning as formative assessment strategy need to pay much attention on students responding with no answer.A teacher self reflecting toward his / her question deployed in the classroom seems to be effective way as one of consideration to make a pedagogical decision for a better classroom interaction.In that way, the teacher probably could reformulate their types and the strategy of questioning in classroom sequence involving how teacher initiates the question, anticipate students' response, and reactions toward students' response.In addition, the need of waiting time in delivering a higher level of questions and the arrangement of delivering a various types of question from simple to complex level, need also be considered to minimize the extent of teachers fail in doing questioning strategies.Finally, it is hoped that this study may contribute to the knowledge base by providing insights into how questioning can be developed as an assessment tool.It also offers concrete suggestions regarding how to improve questioning skills.

Table 1 .
Question Types and Examples

what way Mahrus that they are different
?'(Meeting 3)

Table 2 .
Response Type and Examples

s defend argument.... we mix our argument , so we still keep our opinion with the strong argument.
T : the first one, what did you get from your reading in your house to the debating handbook that i ask you to read? what did your opinion about "debate" ?Ss : (silent whithin few second) suddenly one of the students raise her hand.T : Ok ...Luluk S 1 : class or argument or text ....a... T : Class of argument , how you define about class argument?Class it?Or how is it?S 1 : It'

It means same.. same with that..it means it must have a winner
1 : Ya just like discussion in formal T : Ok what do you want to say.Do you agree?S 2 : I'm not agree T : Ok you don't agree.Good.If you don't agree just share your argument why you don't agree.S 2 : Different

third in line split. You got the information? Have you read about this one? What does it means?
will be your turn next week.Next, Ainun OK.Mention something Ainun.S 1 : I think prime minister is the third line.S 1 : It's like what you, what you say in each group , each speaker.
T : Ok, go.. T : Ok, is it the same?Or different?S 1 : Different I think T : Different ok, how about the split then?S 1 : The split is like aa.......(unclear) T : Ok,

have you got any information? And try to report about this one
. S 1 : Like aa ... a...(unclear) different.Oh iya, define job of each group.
T : Defining job, Ok next, what job?Very good Ainun, thank you.Note.T=Teacher; S 1 =One student

No, that's ok anyone else? Do you want to continue or giving additional information to Putri's information or you have something else.
S 1 : I think the prime minister must divide and set up the debate.And then present the position the and then ,the....... position and keep team.