hi. Have just received a bunch of resources from you that are amazing. Included in these was a book “Leading Questions” by Jamie McKenzie. I have been very disappointed with this and wonder if any of your staff have really looked through it. The content is very negative and this guy has a lot of bitter barrow’s to push and examples of how bad leaders are (by name) but very little that gives great examples of using questioning in a positive way and examples there of. I ask that you relook at this book and decide whether you really want to be associated with a resource that has very little information and good examples of using questioning as a resource but includes a lot of bitterness and running down of people and businesses. Would love to get some feedback from you. I have never felt the need to do this before but I think your resource list is too good to be brought down by such a poor pieve of literature. I like to know that whenever I order it will always be good ’stuff’ and not have to worry about paying the occassional ‘dog’ Thanks for listening to my feedback.
by D H, Christchurch
Resource by Jamie McKenzie
July 11th, 2009 · 4 Comments
Tags: HOW TO TEACH THINKING
4 responses so far ↓
1 Jean // Jul 11, 2009 at 6:26 pm
ellis
Thank you for your email and comments on “Leading Questions”. Sorry to take so long to reply – we had to find time to look at the book again!
First, let me say that we will unquestioningly refund your money on the book; if you’d like to return it to us (whether marked or not) we will happily refund your money, or you can choose other item(s) to replace it. No problem – ThinkShop guarantees your satisfaction
Secondly, I agree with you that quite a lot of the content depicts negativity – i.e. examples of poor leadership, bad decision-making etc – even down to naming names. More in the opening chapters than in the rest of the book. But I also have to add that the author states, “Effective questioning (for leadership) requires courage, faith and perseverance. It is not for the meek, the mild and the hesitant.” So he most definitely gives us a “no-holds-barred” view of major decisions that have been made in our world by ‘leaders’, and the awful consequences they have had. And thus, a constant reminder that blind faith and blind obedience are self-defeating. I assume he means this as a ‘call-to-arms’ for current and would-be leaders; a bucket of cold water to really make us aware of how important good leadership is, and of how dogged determination is needed. ( I guess in your case, it took dogged determination to finish reading his book!)
I do think he also offers positive advice (e.g. p41, “Traits of the Serial Questioner”, and p54-60 on “”Punchy Questions for Effective Questioning”, to name but two.) Overall, I believe his approach is to try to open our eyes to the hard work and ‘digging deep’ that is needed (see his chapter on Probing). However, his style of writing is definitely a very personal one, and it will not appeal to all! So that said, Dellis please rest assured that we totally understand and appreciate your comments, and your point of view!
We are delighted to get feedback on books – everyone has their own ‘take’ on something- and we were most interested in your comments. We have taken the liberty of passing your comments on to the author – I think we will all be interested to hear his response!
We look forward to hearing from you, and how you would like to be either reimbursed or what you would like to choose instead
Best regards
JEAN
and the team at ThinkShop
2 Jean // Jul 11, 2009 at 6:35 pm
Hi Jean
I would like to say thanks and well done for being open minded to my feedback. I have marked pages as I’ve read so I would not feel comfortable with sending the book back.
I do agree that there are some interesting points in the book. I guess the thing that disappointed me the most was that I felt he was being hypocritical in his book by saying one thing ie. role modelling the behaviours you would like to encourage and then writing the book in the vein of being close minded and often picking out the worst examples of leadership. When I read books such as this I expect there to be lots of exemplars of the points that are being raised and discussed. This would include lots of good points as well as some warnings for short comings.
As someone who is keenly interested in and actively persuing ways to expand my own and others thinking and leadership skills, attitude is high on my list of values. This author does not portray the positive attitude that I have come to expect when working within this skill set. Running others down to the point of defamation (robber baron) is not how a good leader acts in my view.
Thanks again for an amazing resource list and I will be back but will steer clear of this author. Do you have any books on questioning that you can recommend? I am particularly interested in using questioning with and for children of the 9-13 year age group.
Very impressed with your feedback.
Kind regards
DH (CHCH)
3 Jean // Jul 11, 2009 at 6:36 pm
Hello D
It sounds as though we’re coming from exactly the same angle! I do so agree with your opinions and also your teaching approach. In fact, I wish more people who did education workshops, would practise what they preach and stop just TALKING to us!!
Questioning, OPV (other people’s viewpoint), Reflection, and Transfer are the four most important things to me in teaching students… and it sounds like this is the same with you. Here are a few of the resources that I use for questioning, as well as the other three, which I thinks you might be interested in:
-Question Starters (a pack of A 4 cards for display, to be used as question starters for students, as well as a handy reminder to teachers… e.g. “What if new evidence came to light that…?” “What do you think is the most important point we’ve reached so far?”; “Can we name some kinds of people who could have a different viewpoint here?”; “Can someone take this idea a bit further?” “What might change here in the future?”)
-Thinking with Rich Concepts; 10 concepts including happiness, choice, ownership, that leads students into thoughtful guided discussion. Includes worksheets
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-Thinking Talking Exploring; various concepts, each comes with a pack of laminated cards to hand out to small groups of students for them to discuss, and then place their card under one of the three headings on the board (e.g. Is Fair, Don’t Know Need More Information, Is Not Fair). Vigorous discussion and then ensues with the whole group as they discuss placement! Very popular for questioning, and for establishing prior knowledge. NZ $9 per set. Concepts include fairness; honesty; immigrants; courage… and more.
D, we really appreciate your feedback. In fact I’ve enjoyed discussing this with you!
Just out of interest, what school are you at?
Cheers
JEAN
4 Jean // Jul 11, 2009 at 7:21 pm
Hey Jean
Glad you asked as my children go to Discovery1 in Christchurch (http://www.discovery1.school.nz) which is a special character state school with a focus on community, collaboration and asking the children what they need in order to learn (amongst other cool things of course). One of the special things about our school is the involvement of parents and adults within the community. This means that… I am actively involved in learning and teaching at the school throughout the school week.
Our senior staff have just come back from the thinking conference over in KL and are buzzing. I am excited because it means that I have others to now really get into some good conversations with about thinking (being a natural interest of mine for a long time).
So glad to have found your website, even more grateful that you are NZ based and I have bookmarked your blog too as you have a lot to offer obviously.
What a pleasure to deal with a business that is not only passionate about their subject but also offer great resources and the very best in customer and follow up service.
Excellent.
Kind regards
DH
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