2026/07/22 by Aaron Yarmel
Social Sciences · Psychology · #Science Education and Pedagogy #Education and Critical Thinking Development #Educational Strategies and Epistemologies
paper · doi:10.1111/edth.70102
Abstract The success of an inquiry dialogue depends on the quality of its central question. Yet, evaluating inquiry dialogue questions is harder than it appears. One approach is to maintain that inquiry dialogue questions are philosophical questions, but there is no successful method of identifying all and only philosophical questions. Another approach is to appeal to Peter Worley's influential taxonomy of grammatical and conceptual openness, which builds on Philip Cam's question quadrant model. I advance an alternative that addresses the limitations of previous models while preserving their benefits. This model includes two dimensions: grammatical scope, the extent to which a question's grammar constrains what could count as an answer, and disputational scope, the extent to which a question is subject to reasonable and actual disagreement among the inquirers. Questions fail as inquiry dialogue questions when either dimension is too wide or too narrow, and I show how facilitators can apply this framework when selecting questions and in the midst of an inquiry itself.