Encourage young students to ask questions with a guessing game. Cut out letters, numbers and shapes from construction paper in a variety of colors, and place them in a basket or plastic container. Ask students to come up one at a time, stand facing away from the class and choose an item from the container. Encourage the class to guess what the student is holding by asking questions: For example, students might raise their hands and ask the color of the item, if the item is a letter or a number, or how many sides the item has.
Use rewards to encourage students to ask questions during class discussions. Tell students that when they ask a question they will receive a prize ticket. Students who ask more questions will receive more prize tickets. Create a prize bin for students to choose from, with small prizes such as pencils or stickers for three tickets to bigger prizes like a homework pass or extra five minutes of recess for 15 tickets. At the end of the week, let students turn in their tickets for prizes.
Provide an opportunity for students to share something about themselves and teach them to ask questions at the same time, recommends the website Sandbox Learning. Ask students to bring in an item from home to share. Have students sit in a circle with their items. Give each student a chance to hold up his item to show the class, but instead of asking the student to tell his classmates about the item, encourage students to ask questions about it instead. Go around the circle and ask each student to ask a question about the item.
Some students worry that their questions are stupid, and are afraid to ask questions in front of their classmates. Give students an opportunity to ask questions anonymously with a question bowl. After a class lecture or reading assignment, give each student a slip of paper and encourage them to write down a question they would like to ask. Gather all of the questions and place them in a goldfish bowl. Pass the bowl around and ask each student to pull out a question to ask you or the class. Let students know that the questions in the bowl are all good questions so that they become more confident and can eventually ask questions on their own.