This week I was grilled. Pummelled with questions from all sides. Probing, funny and utterly disarming – these queries were not for the fainthearted. But I had signed up for this experience and left feeling invigorated. It was like I had undergone a mental exfoliation.
I took on a children’s assembly. Years 1 and 2 to be precise, an age range of five to seven. And they were ready for me; I, less so for them. All these little ones had been told was that I asked questions for my job and they could do the same: interview an interviewer.
Now, having a son in the same age bracket, I thought I had this one nailed. But it soon became apparent that this was an experience as predictable as a perimenopausal woman’s cycle.
The adage goes: never work with children and animals on account of their unpredictability and ability to steal the limelight, as well as upstage an adult, usually brilliantly – or at least memorably.
But I quite like things going a bit awry. Perhaps that is why I really love and prefer most of my broadcasting to be live. I crave that edge of “anything can and might happen”. So I settled in to the experience – as much as I could – not quite knowing what was coming next.
I have spoken to groups of older children before, who have been rather inscrutable and honestly not as forthcoming as I had hoped with their thoughts and questions (crippling teen self-awareness and embarrassment having already set in). Well, it turns out five to seven year olds is where it’s at.
Don’t get me wrong, I have had brilliant sessions with older children interested in learning more about media and communication, but I know now that there is a lot more warming up needed and, as the speaker, you must quickly become comfortable with not garnering some of the usual responses (even when you volley your best jokes to the sound of silence).
By stark contrast, my questioners this week needed no speech or preamble. Warm-ups were utterly superfluous. You would lose the room immediately trying to say anything other than your name and, in my case, waving your BBC lanyard and showing off the addictive stretchy bit.
The children got straight to it and this rare directness is why I wanted to share the experience more broadly with you. These wondrous mini-humans knew how to ask short, sharp and well-intentioned questions. I believe all of us adults, even so-called professional questioners, could do well to heed their example.
Hands shot straight up – children across the hall craning their whole bodies to be chosen – showing no sign of wanting to seem anything other than keen. Keen is a whole vibe we typically shun in this country from around 11 or 12 and, personally, I lament its demise.
And then it began.
“Do you ask hard questions?”
“Do you have enough time to have fun?”
“What are your favourite things to do with your family?”
“Do you interview people from other countries?”
“Why do you do what you do?”
“How do you make ideas happen?”
“How do you feel if you aren’t allowed to make an idea happen?”
“Do you get scared talking on the radio or TV?”
And my personal favourite: “Do you like being interviewed – like you are right now?” Meta. That child nailed it.
The questions were quick-fire and to the point. Such discipline is often lacking in similar public squares solely occupied by adults. On the radio I regularly receive brilliant questions and texts from listeners. Some of those questions have dramatically changed and improved my interviews – as someone not in the room can lob in an incredible fact or personal experience that improves the vantage point.
But I have also borne witness, as a former radio phone-in host on LBC during my first broadcasting job, and when I chair live events, to a few other questioning techniques by adults in possession of the mic.
There is the non-questioner opinion giver. This is an individual who usually means well but has a great deal to say on the subject at hand despite having been asked to pose a question. No question ever comes. Even after an often lengthy speech. Even if the speech is good, people don’t engage, as they notice the social contract has been broken and the request for a question ignored.
There is the shy inquisitor. They often have a kernel of something brilliant at the heart of their inquiry, but go around the houses to get there and then don’t properly go there. This is probably due to awkwardness and losing the nerve to ask the question they really want answered. This sort of moment is where I usually step in and try to channel my inner five year old, dispense with our social norms of politeness, and ask the real questions.
There are those who specialise in posing a question that bears no relation at all to the subject at hand. It can be so random, you wonder whether they have been engaging at all.
And sometimes, just sometimes, there is the rude inquisitor: someone who wants to provoke but opts for the lowest-hanging fruit. It usually bombs, but can also lead to the recipient showing a flash of themselves they hadn’t expected to share.
But let us also not forget those who never ask at all. This is a significant group in all groups. Whether that’s in the public square, local hustings or at school or college. Even in one-to-one settings such as dates. Think of all of the fascinating vantage points and lines of inquiry we have all missed out on, often due to lack of confidence or social training that underscores the value of such participation.
In fact, studies of questions and how styles and intentions differ between the sexes have been done with interesting results. The sociolinguist Deborah Tannen posits in her book You Just Don’t Understand that women and men view the purpose of conversation totally differently.
Men can see the point of it as gaining status in society by “exhibiting knowledge and skill, and by holding centre-stage through verbal performance such as storytelling, joking or imparting information”. Women, meanwhile, tend to use questions to discover “similarities and matching experiences”, she says.
The children I faced fell into none of these patterns or traps that develop as we mature. They asked heartfelt and crucially short questions. I fully understood each point without further clarification and responded in kind.
My answers also had to match their speedy tempo. I was forced to speak simply and with brevity so as to ensure I didn’t lose the room. Again, something those responding to questions in adult life could do very well to heed. Not too short, but less is always more from both questioner and responder.
But the very best part of my school experience? The unexpected hug at the end. One little girl threw her arms around me and was simply so happy with the experience we had shared. It was pure and I welcomed it.
Thank you for schooling me – even though it was meant to be the other way around.