Luma Connection #34: The Chain Response Questioning Technique

Collaboration and connection are important for our social-emotional well-being. Importantly, Luma has conducted research and published the benefits for creating learning communities remotely. This year, Luma will provide specific strategies you can implement to connect learners remotely. We are calling these strategies our Luma Connections.

Teaching Tool: LumaLive®
Nugget the MascotThis is Luma’s synchronous or same time meeting tool. This online tool allows learners to interact with each other to explore a topic and to discuss key concepts, share experiences, interact with each other, and to ask questions in real time. Interactions are in real-time and can be mentor-learner, learner-to-content, learner-to-self, and learner-to-learner.

Tip: 
Use the Chain Response Questioning Technique

A simple and effective way to deepen the conversation and get learners talking in online discussion is to use the Chain Response Questioning Technique in which you call on learners to add onto a previous response until the response is completely flushed out. Each response is a link in the chain for the conversation topic.

Here is how to use the Chain Response Technique:

  1. Pose the question.
  2. Select a learner to respond.
  3. After the learner responds, say “And?” or “What else can we add to that?”
  4. Select the next learner to respond and add to the initial response.
  5. Repeat this until there is nothing left to add.

Remember: Make sure to provide enough think time before calling on learners to respond. Consider selecting learners at random versus calling on volunteers to respond. This sets the expectation of participation especially if you explicitly state this is the procedure for soliciting responses.

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