GIGANTE, LUCILLE MARY.

Little is known about teacher questioning behavior in World and American literature courses as taught in high schools, although most teachers from primary through college generally use the memory level question and do not plan questions in sequence. This study focused on the specific questions selected teachers of secondary literature asked their students in order to determine the frequency of questions asked at each cognitive level and the presence or absence of questioning patterns. Teacher characteristics such as age, sex, years of teaching experience, and academic preparation were examined to determine their relationship to the number of types of questions asked by teachers. Matched for similarity in size, socio-economic level, and geographically representative of their area, three secondary schools were chosen from Brevard County, one each from North, Central, and South Brevard. Twenty-two out of 26 cooperating teachers of students of average and above average ability in World and American literature courses participated. Using a cassette recorder, each teacher taped one discussion lesson per week for six consecutive weeks in the fall of the 1979-1980 school year. Rogers' checksheet, The Teacher Oral Question Observation Schedule was used to code four randomly selected tapes from each teacher. Memory questions totalled 56.4% of all questions asked, while interpretation totalled 20% and procedure 16.8%. The remaining categories (pupil input, translation, evaluation, application, analysis, synthesis, affective and textbook) accounted for 6.8% of the total number of questions asked. One of every two questions asked was a memory question; nine questions out of every 10 asked were either memory, interpretation or procedure. Generally, teachers with masters' degrees asked fewer questions than those who earned only a bachelor's degree. Teachers generally did not pattern their questions hierarchically. Patterns indicated a reliance on lower cognitive and procedural questions. Only three significant relationships were uncovered in correlating teacher characteristics with question level of frequency. Interpretation questions, 20% of all questions, were negatively correlated to the number of quarter hours' training the teacher had in English. Procedural questions, which totalled 16.8% of all questions, were positively correlated to the prior training a teacher had in classroom techniques. Pupil input questions, totalling 3% of all questions, were positively correlated to the teacher's number of years' experience. Hypothesis I, IA, and IB were rejected. The frequency of questions asked by teachers varied; however, the percentage use of categories remained constant. Teachers are choosing lower cognitive and procedural questions nine times out of 10. Hypothesis II was rejected. Teachers are choosing combinations of lower cognitive and procedural patterns of questioning. Hypothesis III was accepted. Except in three instances, teachers used a consistent pattern of questioning, no matter what their background was. The more quarter hours' training the teacher had in English, the fewer interpretation questions he asked. Training in classroom techniques tends to encourage the asking of procedural questions. Teachers who have taught longer generally ask more pupil input questions.