In the ‘Book of Beautiful Questions’ by Warren Berger, he provided tips for warming up your questioning muscle.

One of them focused specifically on what families can do with their children using the acronym L.I.F.E. L stands for little, I stands for information, F stands for failure and E stands for Exchange. The L.I.F.E questions are designed to help children remember little anecdotes from their daily experiences while creating shared memories with family members. I used L.I.F.E questions recently with my daughter given her experience with homeschooling. I asked:

1. What weird little thing sticks out in your mind from homeschooling this year?

2. What piece of information did you learn from homeschooling overall this year?

3. Is there anything with homeschooling that you tried and failed at this year with homeschooling?

4. What memorable exchange did you remember from homeschooling this year.

The kicker for me though with these prompts weren’t really her answers. I asked her instead to read each question as a prompt and ask more questions if needed. She did. We had a beautiful exchange that is slowly helping to build her questioning muscle. My goal for her and her brothers is to help them question more knowing it will require practice to get used to questioning, get comfortable with challenging basic assumptions, shifting their perspective, or considering alternatives or opposite ideas. I also intend to share our experience confronting the enemies of questioning, include fear and lack of time. In all and for your children, keep L.I.F.E questions in mind especially with little children.