Bloom's Buttons

Higher level questioning is on everyone's minds these days.  I knew I wanted to create something for Blooms, but just couldn't decide on how I wanted it to look in my classroom.  It's always been something I just do without even thinking.  I always gear my questioning toward higher level thinking, but don't necessarily tell my students where each question ranks on the Bloom's Hierarchy.

I've come up with a little something to incorporate more of the Bloom's language and questioning in my day to day classroom discussions.  We always have a read aloud for the week, whether it's from our reading adoption (Reading Street) or a trade book.  My plan is to use this form to teach the levels of Bloom's Taxonomy and then have them answer questions about the story at the different levels of Blooms.

My analogy will be when the shirt is fully buttoned, then you are fully dressed and ready to go.  And when you are able to answer all the button level questions, then you have a full or complete understanding of the story.

My plan is to have button breaks, where a student will randomly choose a colored button from a can. The color they choose will correspond to a Bloom's Button Card which contains a question  that corresponds to a particular level of Bloom's Taxonomy.  Some times I may have them answer the question independently, they could do this either orally or in a journal.  Other times they may try to answer the question with a buddy or a group.  The goal is to get them thinking about the story as well as their own thinking!!!

 These are the buttons that I'm using in my jar.  Nice and big.

Notice that the orange buttons are missing in the middle picture above.  Well, we had an uh oh, this evening.  My toddler decided to stick the orange buttons inside the skinny opening of my very expensive laminator.  Yikes, it was not fun finding a solution for that one!!!

 Here is an example of a few of the cards.

 

There are 9 questions for each of the 6 levels of Bloom's Taxonomy. There are also blank (editable) cards provided for you to add your own questions as you see fit.  There is also a black line master available of the Button Chart, if you would like to have your students color it in and then place it in a journal/notebook  to refer to throughout the year.  You can click the picture below to head on over to my teacher store.

Hope my students and possibly yours love their button breaks!!!