Lesson 2: Writing Good Survey Questions

About 30 minutes — Activity-based lesson

What You Will Learn

This lesson covers:

What makes a good survey question: clear, specific, unbiased
Leading questions and why they are unfair
Open vs. closed questions
Practice: fix 5 bad survey questions

What makes a good survey question: clear, specific, unbiased

This section covers the key ideas about what makes a good survey question: clear, specific, unbiased. Discuss with your group or family and explore the concepts together.

Leading questions and why they are unfair

This section covers the key ideas about leading questions and why they are unfair. Discuss with your group or family and explore the concepts together.

Open vs. closed questions

This section covers the key ideas about open vs. closed questions. Discuss with your group or family and explore the concepts together.

Practice: fix 5 bad survey questions

This section covers the key ideas about practice: fix 5 bad survey questions. Discuss with your group or family and explore the concepts together.

Check Your Understanding

1. What is a leading question?

Answer: A question that pushes people toward a certain answer. Example: 'Don't you agree that pizza is the best lunch?' leads people to say yes. A fair question is: 'What is your favorite lunch?'

2. What is the difference between an open and closed question?

Answer: A closed question has set answers to choose from ('Do you prefer cats or dogs?'). An open question lets people answer freely ('What is your favorite animal and why?'). Both are useful for different purposes.

3. Why should survey questions be specific?

Answer: Vague questions get vague answers. 'Do you like school?' is too broad. 'What is your favorite subject this year?' is specific and gives useful data.

4. What makes a survey question biased?

Answer: A biased question favors one answer over others. 'Don't you love our amazing school lunch?' is biased. 'How would you rate today's school lunch: great, okay, or not good?' is fair.

Key Takeaways

What makes a good survey question: clear, specific, unbiased
Leading questions and why they are unfair
Open vs. closed questions
Practice: fix 5 bad survey questions

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Continue to Lesson 3: Who You Ask Matters

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