Question and Response Levels and Lapse Time Intervals

Abstract

One hundred and eighty question-response diads were obtained from taped sessions of eleven elementary teachers interacting with a group of their students. Teachers had been trained in asking questions at higher levels on the Bloom taxonomy and had been sensitized to the critical problem of allowing students time to consider questions and formulate answers. The lapsed time between the end of the teacher’s question and the beginning of the student’s response was determined for each diad. Each question and each response was classified by level on the Bloom scale (3). It was found that lapse time differs by question level and by response level, but that lapse time does not increase directly with the hierarchial level of the question or the response. A strong relationship between the question level and the level of cognitive functioning of the elementary student as reflected in his level of responding was found.