What's a discussion question?
Discussion questions are - obviously! - questions designed to provoke discussion. So how do you come up with discussion questions?
* Ask open-ended questions. Questions that have a yes or no answer, or a question that has one right answer, do not make good discussion questions.
* If you're confused about something, it may be a good starting point for discussion. Figure out whether your confusion stems from a lack of information - in which case you need to ask clarification, not discussion questions - or if there's something worth discussion about your confusion. Is the dialogue hard to follow? Do you wonder if the author had a reason for writing it that way? Or are there a lot of terms being used that you're unfamiliar with? What might the author be saying about her or his relationship with the audience by doing that?
* Just try it out. Not every discussion question will work, and sometimes even the best discussion questions fall completely flat. (Take it from someone who's asked a lot of them: sometimes, you just can't tell.)
updated 17. Sept. 2002