Question Ladder (Progressive Difficulty)
A Question Ladder (Progressive Difficulty) is a good way for learning or problem-solving to be organized. Here, the participants answer questions in increasing levels of complexity sequentially, which is the primary concept. The arrangement of questions is in such a way that the difficulty level is increasing. This technique helps learners to form the necessary fundamental knowledge first to deal with more advanced topics which, therefore, leads to confidence and deeper understanding.
One of the main functions of a Question Ladder is to facilitate the journey of students through a learn-in-step approach by initiating with simple queries and progressively bringing in difficult ones. This style will be an encouragement to the students to think critically and will also assist in the visualization of the topic by the students, thus, problem solving will be easier for them later. A good example of this is a math class where the teacher might begin with simple sum problems before he/she shows algebraic equations.
The implementation of Question Ladders in a classroom is done by the creation of the series of questions that concern the selected topic that are being organized by the difficulty. Teachers can hand out to students these questions in steps, with the aim of answering them starting from simpler till reaching the harder ones progressively. To illustrate, during a history class, the teacher could begin by asking about critical chronological events, then proceed to the questions concerning the causes of those said events and then finally the ones that demand the students to examine the historical times analogy.
Teaching your own curricular questions to your students provides them with a means of asking questions in a structured and more clear way. This not only helps them in the current topic but also aids them in their learning of future topics. Similar to this, students who work with problem-tree questions can solve them more easily and, thus, can be more successful in classes where problem-solving is not as easy. For instance, a student may feel stressed about learning calculus because it has many complex concepts and problems, but with the teacher teaching simpler problems that lead to complex ones, the student will easy understand.
Absolutely, Question Ladders will not be incased only in the academic front but also enriched by professional training & self-study programs. In an office environment, a manager can develop a training program with the use of Question Ladder, where employees can do the step-wise growth of skills through it, beginning from elementary to advance levels. In a programming camp, for example, learners could begin with fundamental syntax and concepts before confronting more intricate programming exercises.