Here are some of the best questions for a student survey about teacher effectiveness, plus practical tips on building surveys that dig deeper. If you want, you can use Specific to generate a survey like this in seconds—it’s as easy as chatting with AI.
Best open-ended questions for student surveys about teacher effectiveness
Open-ended questions give students freedom to share what they truly think—no checkboxes, no limits. They’re the secret to surfacing honest, unexpected feedback that you might never think to ask for. These are perfect when you want in-depth, nuanced answers that go beyond “Yes” or “No.” (But keep in mind: the reliability and validity of open-text student feedback can be affected by biases such as gender, age, or other factors, so always interpret with care [1].)
What does your teacher do that helps you learn best in class?
Describe a time when your teacher explained something especially clearly or in a way that made sense to you.
If you could change one thing about the way your teacher teaches, what would it be?
How does your teacher make the classroom feel comfortable and welcoming (or not)?
What’s something your teacher could do to help you understand lessons better?
When you’re struggling with schoolwork, how does your teacher support you?
Can you give an example of a lesson, project, or activity you especially enjoyed?
What’s something your teacher does that motivates you to try your best?
How does your teacher give feedback, and what would make it more helpful?
What should your teacher keep doing because it really works well for you?
Best single-select multiple-choice questions for student surveys about teacher effectiveness
Single-select multiple-choice questions are essential when you need to quantify feedback or spot patterns across lots of responses. They’re especially useful to get everyone “talking” quickly—students may find it easier to start with a simple click than to write a paragraph. Once the conversation is rolling, you can layer on follow-ups or open-ended items for detail. These questions offer a useful, structured snapshot you can benchmark and track over time.
Question: How clearly does your teacher explain new concepts?
Extremely clearly
Somewhat clearly
Not so clearly
Not clearly at all
Question: How often does your teacher encourage questions during lessons?
Always
Sometimes
Rarely
Never
Question: What is the most effective way your teacher supports your learning?
Giving detailed feedback
Providing extra help after class
Using a variety of teaching methods
Other
When to follow up with "why?" When a response isn’t specific, always follow up. For example, if a student selects “Rarely” for “How often does your teacher encourage questions?” following up with “Can you share a specific example of when you wanted to ask a question but didn’t feel comfortable?” invites real, actionable insights.
When and why to add the "Other" choice? Use “Other” to let students bring up something you may have missed. When they select this option, a follow-up question like “Can you describe what you had in mind?” can reveal new areas for improvement you didn’t anticipate.
NPS-type question: Should you include it?
The NPS (Net Promoter Score) question—“How likely are you to recommend this teacher to a friend?” (on a 0–10 scale)—gives you a high-level sense of satisfaction and loyalty. For student surveys about teacher effectiveness, it’s a surprisingly useful number. If paired with open-ended follow-ups, you can go from a simple score to real stories and actionable feedback. Check out this NPS survey example for students to see how easy it is to include this type of question in your survey logic.
The power of follow-up questions
Automatic, AI-driven follow-up questions are the secret sauce behind conversational surveys. Traditional forms often leave you with flat, confusing answers. With automated followups, you get the “why” and “how”—right away, and at scale.
Specific’s AI is built to be a smart, relentless interviewer: it asks for clarification, digs into details, and makes each student feel heard. You don’t have to chase people down over email to clarify half-answers; the AI handles it in real time, just like an expert researcher.
Student: “The class is okay.”
AI follow-up: “When you say ‘okay,’ what do you enjoy most and what could be better?”
How many followups to ask? You usually only need two or three targeted follow-up questions per answer. Specific lets you set a maximum follow-up depth, so if a student gives a clear response, the survey can jump ahead—no wasted time, no frustration.
This makes it a conversational survey: Instead of feeling like a test, students participate in a back-and-forth conversation that makes sharing feedback natural and engaging.
AI survey response analysis: Even with complex, text-heavy responses, it’s simple to review the data. Specific’s AI-powered analysis helps you unlock key patterns, summarize insights across hundreds of replies, or even drill down to the comments that matter most—all in seconds.
These automated follow-up questions are a new approach—just try generating an AI survey to see how seamless the experience can be.
How to compose a prompt for ChatGPT or other GPTs
If you want AI to help come up with questions for student surveys about teacher effectiveness, don’t just ask for a list. Add some context about your survey’s purpose and your specific needs—the difference is noticeable.
Try this simple prompt first:
Suggest 10 open-ended questions for student survey about teacher effectiveness.
For better results, add detail about your context and goal. For example:
I’m designing a survey for high school students to give feedback on their math teacher. The goal is to help our teacher understand what works, what doesn’t, and how students feel in the classroom. The questions should be open-ended, encourage honest answers, and focus on specific teaching behaviors. Suggest 10 open-ended questions for this scenario.
Then, you can ask AI to organize the questions:
Look at the questions and categorize them. Output categories with the questions under them.
Finally, if you’re only interested in some categories (for example, “student motivation” or “clarity of explanations”), prompt AI like this:
Generate 10 questions for categories clarity of explanations, student motivation, classroom environment.
What is a conversational survey?
Conversational surveys work like a chat, not a test. Instead of making students scroll through pages of static questions, the survey adapts and responds—to their words, their ideas, and even their hesitations. Here’s where AI survey builders like Specific really outshine manual survey creation:
Manual Surveys | AI-Generated Conversational Surveys |
|---|---|
Rigid and linear; little personalization | Adapts to each student’s response; dynamic follow-ups; natural flow |
Time-consuming to create and edit | Create, edit, or update surveys just by chatting with AI |
Flat, unstructured responses (harder to analyze) | AI summarizes, categorizes, and helps you chat with response data |
Hard to engage students | Feels like conversation; higher response rates and quality |
Why use AI for student surveys? AI-driven conversational surveys remove the biggest pain points—unclear responses, low engagement, and slow analysis. An AI survey example highlights how these tools adapt instantly, diving deeper when needed while keeping the student comfortable and engaged. You don’t have to guess; you can see how easy it is to create and edit an AI-powered survey for this purpose.
Specific is built for fast, expert-quality conversational surveys. You get best-in-class user experience for both the people creating the survey and the students responding to it.
See this teacher effectiveness survey example now
Ready to reimagine student feedback? See what conversational, AI-generated surveys can do—gather richer insights, adapt to every answer, and discover actionable patterns that help teachers and students thrive.