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Reading: Questioning

Questioning | Reading Expository text | Vocabulary
How to Read a Textbook | Reading and Interpreting Diverse Materials

Questioning is a critical strategy that helps readers make meaning of literature by promoting critical thinking about what is being read.

Questioning occurs as a natural part of the classroom routine as teachers encourage students to pose, discuss, and answer questions. Questions can be generated by the reader, a peer, the teacher, or curriculum developers. Any one of these kinds of questions can be answered by the student individually, after discussion with others, or in collaboration with a peer. While most questions require having the text available, some might not.

Questions with different purposes can be asked and answered before, during, and after reading. Before students read, they often use questions to activate prior knowledge, make predictions, and wonder about big ideas that are not answered in the text. During reading, students form questions to compare and generalize, identify the theme, and clarify meaning. After they read, students use questioning to locate information, understand and remember events and characters, and identify the theme.

Questions—whether before, during, or after reading—can have different qualities. Check out the examples at the following web site: www.springfield.k12.il.us/resources/languagearts/
readingwriting/tchrques.html

Four Types of Questions

There are four key types of questions:

• "Right there" questions (text explicit). These are literal questions where the answer is in the text itself.
  
  
• "Think and search" questions (text implicit). The answer is implicit in the text but the student must synthesize, infer, or summarize to find the answer. Think and search questions tend to be more open-ended without set answers.
  
  
• "Reader and author" questions (text implicit or experience-based). The answer needs the reader to combine his or her own experiences with what the text states, i.e., the knowledge presented by the author.
  
  
• "On my own" questions (text implicit or experience-based). The reader needs to generate the answer from his or her prior knowledge. The reader may not need to read the text to answer, but the answer would certainly be shaped differently after reading the text.

Sites That Matter

To find out more about how to use questioning strategies, select from the navigation menu below.

• Questioning Strategies Before Reading
  
• Questioning Strategies During Reading
  
• Questioning Strategies After Reading

Questioning Strategies Before Reading

The purpose of posing questions before reading is for readers to:

• Elicit prior knowledge related to the core ideas of the text
  
• Make connections between what they know and the subject of the text
  
• Set a purpose for reading
  
• Construct predictions

Below we list research-based strategies for questioning before reading. For each strategy we provide a description and links to additional information, classroom examples, and lesson plans.

KWL (Know Want Learn)
Students organize their information about a topic using a three-column chart.

K stands for Know.
What do I already know about this topic?

W stands for Will or Want.
What do I think I will learn about this topic?
What do I want to know about this topic?

L stands for Learned.
What have I learned about this topic?

Here are some web sites that show this strategy in action:

• Strategies for Reading Comprehension K - W - L
  This site provides a useful overview of the KWL strategy with downloadable charts.
  curry.edschool.virginia.edu/go/readquest/strat/kwl.html
  
  
• KWL - A Reading Comprehension Strategy
  This concise AskERIC lesson plan takes the teacher through the three stages of KWL.
  www.eduref.org/cgi-bin/printlessons.cgi/virtual/
  Lessons/Language_Arts/Reading/RDG0042.html
  

Reciprocal Reading
Students working in small groups of four are each assigned a role before they read:

• Predictor
  
• Questioner
  
• Clarifier
  
• Summarizer

During the reading, they take notes and then discuss the text from the point of view of their role. They then switch roles and repeat the process.

Here is a web site that shows this strategy in action:

• Strategies for Reading Comprehension: Reciprocal Teaching
  This site describes reciprocal teaching and its four comprehension strategies: summarizing, questioning, clarifying, and predicting.
  curry.edschool.virginia.edu/go/readquest/strat/rt.html

Scaffolded Reading Experience (SRE)
SRE uses teachers' questions as the basis for the pre-reading engagement of students with text.

Here is a web site that shows this strategy in action:

• Strategies for Teaching Reading
  This site summarizes the SRE, Scaffolded Reading Experience. This process uses scaffolding, which provides students with the necessary assistance in preparation, guidance, and follow-up to help them make connections with the text (scroll mid-way down the page for information on SRE). www.state.tn.us/education/ci/cistandards2001/
  la/cilarstratteachread.htm

Directed Reading Activity (DRA)
This process uses teachers' questions to activate prior knowledge, create interest, and establish the purpose for reading.

Here is a web site that shows this strategy in action:

• Strategies for Teaching Reading
  This site provides basic information about DRA. (scroll mid-way down the page)
  www.state.tn.us/education/ci/cistandards2001/
  la/cilarstratteachread.htm

Questioning Strategies During Reading

Questioning during reading should help the reader to:

• Clarify and review what has happened so far
  
• Confirm or create new predictions
  
• Evaluate the text critically and make personal connections
  
• Compare with other experiences or readings
  
• Monitor reading for meaning and accuracy

Below we describe strategies to use during reading. For each strategy we provide a description and give links to additional information and classroom examples.

Questioning the Author
As students read, they develop questions for the author about the author's intent for the selection and his or her success at communicating it. One format uses these questions:

• Why is the author telling you that?
  
• Does the author say it clearly?
  
• How could the author have said things more clearly?
  
• What would you say instead?

Another modification of this approach is to have students rewrite a selected passage.

Here is a web site that shows this strategy in action:

• Questioning the Author
  This site provides a summary of this strategy and a sample nonfiction text to use for practicing it.
  curry.edschool.virginia.edu/go/readquest/strat/qta.html
  

Learning Logs
Students record their questions about the text in a notebook, on a handout, or by using sticky notes. Students enter their reactions during and after reading a text.

• Madison Metropolitan School District—Mosaic of Thought
  This site offers an example of a learning log for students to use for writing their questions while reading.
  www.madison.k12.wi.us/tnl/langarts/mosaic.htm
  

Double Entry Journal
In the left-hand page or column, students ask questions. After reading, in the right-hand column they answer the questions.

• Double Entry Journal
  This site offers a brief definition and sample graphic of a double entry journal.
  www.sdcoe.k12.ca.us/score/actbank/tdentry.htm

Think-Aloud
The purpose of a think-aloud is to capture the student's thinking about the text during the reading process. The teacher selects a piece of text to model the strategy to the students. While reading the text aloud, the teacher says things such as, "I don't understand this word. Maybe if I keep reading I will find out."

Here are web sites that show this strategy in action:

• Using the Think-Aloud in Reading Instruction
  This site gives teachers an overview, links, and lessons using the think-aloud approach.
  www.suite101.com/article.cfm/1411/87120
  (Scroll down to view the above article.)
  
  
• Guidelines and Student Handouts for Implementing Read-Aloud Strategies in Your Class
  This is a collection of guidelines, checklists, and assessment tools to start think-aloud strategies with your students. It comes from Jeff Wilhelm's book Improving Comprehension With Think-Aloud Strategies.
  teacher.scholastic.com/reading/bestpractices/
  comprehension/strategies.htm
  
  
• Think Alouds
  This brief overview of the think-aloud process provides a downloadable checklist and step-by-step directions on using this strategy in the classroom. literacy.kent.edu/eureka/strategies/think_aloud.pdf

Discussion Webs
A discussion web uses a graphic aid for teaching students to look at both sides of an issue before drawing a conclusion. Students are asked to respond to a yes-no thinking question individually, in pairs, with another set of pairs, and then with the whole class.

Here is a web site that shows this strategy in action:

• Webs (The Discussion Kind!) in the Classroom
  Education World provides an overview, sample lessons, a chart of discussion webs, and cross-curriculum examples.
  www.education-world.com/a_lesson/lesson032.shtml
  

Think-Pair-Share
Students are given a question. They think about the answer individually, in pairs, and then in small groups to reach a consensus.

Here are web sites that show this strategy in action:

• Strategies for Reading to Learn: Think, Pair, Share
  This site offers a concise overview and description of the think, pair, share model.
  curry.edschool.virginia.edu/go/edis771/notes/THNKPRSH.html
  
  
• Connect & Collaborate
  Epals.com enables students to email questions to students in other classrooms.
  www.epals.com/scholastic/index_sch.html?seesf=7018897
  

Questioning Strategies After Reading

The purpose of post-reading strategies is to extend the reading experience by helping the reader to:

• Reinforce the concept that reading is for understanding the meaning of the text and making connections
  
• Model ways of thinking through and organizing the information taken in from reading a text
  
• Think critically about the text
  
• Respond on a personal level

Below are questioning strategies to use after reading. For each strategy we provide a description and give links to additional information and classroom examples.

Journal Writing
On a regular basis, students record their questions, comments, reflections, and reactions in a journal.

Here is a web site that shows this strategy in action:

• Journaling
  This site offers an overview of different kinds of journals, including double entry, www.sdcoe.k12.ca.us/score/actbank/tjournal.htm

Teacher Questions
The teacher leads large and small group discussions using various question guides.

Here is a web site that shows this strategy in action:

• Reading
  This site provides a list of various Teacher-Learning Strategies.
  aquilo.sasked.gov.sk.ca/docs/ela20/teach5.html
  

ORQ - Observe, Ruminate, Question
Students make an observation based on the reading, and then they ruminate or extend it. They end with a final question.

Here is a web site to help put this strategy into action:

• Ask An Expert Sites
  A technology extension of the ORQ activity is to take the final questions, go onto the Web, and get answers from online experts. This site provides links to many sites that have experts in different content areas.
  njnie.dl.stevens-tech.edu/askanexpert.html

Questioning the Author
As students read, they develop questions for the author about the author's intent for the selection and his or her success at communicating it. One format uses these questions:

• Why is the author telling you that?
• Does the author say it clearly?
• How could the author have said things more clearly?
• What would you say instead?

Another modification of this approach is to have students rewrite a selected passage.

Here is a web site that shows this strategy in action:

• Questioning the Author
  This site provides a summary of this strategy and a sample nonfiction text to use for practicing it.
  curry.edschool.virginia.edu/go/readquest/strat/qta.html