Learning to ask better questions: a starter exercise to expose students to conducting interviews

This article reports on a starter exercise that trains beginner interview skills without overloading a course with a single project. The exercise is a response to three developments: first, interviewing skills are undertaught in most political science programmes; second, productive elements of online teaching ought to be integrated in campus-based courses; and, third, experiential learning is possible in virtual spaces. Students are exposed to interviews as a methodology through a lower pressure experience. Replacing two classes, students take part in a series of short, student-led but instructor-organised structured group interviews with practitioners. Students then progress to develop their own independent interviewing skills, including identifying informants, in later courses. Survey data collected from students suggest that applying course concepts was one of the top learning outcomes. Surveys and focus groups also illustrate that the exercise made students see an issue differently and they intend to continue learning about the subject armed with new information. This teaching format is practical for a wide range of themes in political science where experts can be interviewed and students will leave such courses with a question-oriented analytical approach, better equipped to interpret answers, and ready to more extensively engage with interviews in their lives.