The What-If-Not strategy

How can I incorporate the What-If-Not strategy in the micro-teaching?
Our micro-teaching topic is going to be on graph transformation. We will start by graphing some simple graphs, and ask students if they recognize the pattern or relationships between the graphs. For instance, y = 2x+2 is moved vertically upward by two units from y = 2x. From here, I can ask “what if the graph is not moved upward?” Let students explore how equations would change if the graph is moved downward or sideways and then ask students to make some conjectures about the transformation. Finally, I can ask “how would the equation change if the graph moved both vertically and horizontally?” as the “problem posing” part.

What are the strengths and weaknesses about the What-If-Not strategy?
I think the strengths of this approach are:
1. It allows students to think creatively.
2. It might lead to some unexpected and interesting questions that one may not think of.
3. It helps both “strong” and “weak” students by getting students involved in thinking about the problem not just doing the problem.

Here are some weaknesses of this approach:
1. It is very time-consuming; I personally don’t think it will work well in a regular class setting.
2. It could end up like an endless loop, as we create more and more problems.
3. It could lead to some totally unrelated topic.
4. We could scare people away from math with series of math questions.

To be honest, I think this approach works well with students who are interested in Math but not so much for those who are already bored with math and yet we throw even more questions at them. I think it works best for those graduate students or mathematicians who are looking for more ideas.