ACTIVITIES TO TEACH THE STRATEGY OF QUESTIONING
Activity #1: Questioning the Author (taken from Scholastic’s Reading Strategies Toolkit: Nonfiction)
Questioning the author helps students understand the big and important ideas in nonfiction texts by inviting them to pause after a tough sentence or passage, or at the end of a section or chapter, and use queries to think through the information. This strategy is particularly helpful for nonfiction because it encourages students to question information that they might otherwise gloss over or skip because the author’s meaning seemed unclear.
1) Write the initiating and follow-up questions on chart paper. These questions are the same for every nonfiction text because they are focusing students on the text’s meaning and how ideas connect to one another:
a. Initiating Queries
i. What is the author trying to say here?
ii. What do you think the author wants us to know?
iii. What is the author talking about?
iv. What is the important message in this section?
b. Follow-Up Queries
i. So what did the author mean right here?
ii. That’s what the author said, but what did the author mean?
iii. What does the author want me to understand from these details? This information?
iv. Does this make sense based on what the author told us before?
v. How does this connect with what the author has told us?
vi. But does the author tell us why?
vii. Why do you think the author tells us this now?
2) Name the strategy and introduce it to the students. Here is what to say:
a. Today, I will demonstrate how a strategy called Questioning the Author works. This reading strategy is important because it uses open-ended queries or questions to help you build comprehension and new understandings while you read. It encourages you to connect ideas between and among sentences, paragraphs, and chapters and to link what you read to your background knowledge. It’s our job as readers to figure out what the author is trying to say. Using QtA (Questioning the Author) will help us figure out the meaning of challenging passages and build new understandings about a topic, issue, or theme.
3) Model how you use the questions to interpret and comprehend a nonfiction text. A sample text is Amelia and Eleanor Go for a Ride by Pam Munoz Ryan. Here’s the think aloud:
a. The QtA question is “What does the author want me to understand from the title and the front and back covers?” I think the author wants me to know that Amelia is Amelia Earhart; she’s wearing a pilot’s cap and glasses. I know she was a famous pilot who crashed on a solo trip across the Atlantic. Eleanor is Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of President Roosevelt-the picture of the White House on the back helps me kow that. The title that joins their names tells me that they are friends having an adventure on an airplane, which is on the front cover, and in a car parked in front of the White House, which is on the back cover. The author wants me to think that their adventure took place at night because there are stars on the front and back covers.
4) After your think-aloud, encourage student feedback and questions.
5) Continue QtA and having students respond until you observe that most students can use the details to answer the queries successfully,
6) Invite students to choose queries after you read aloud a selection. You will still be involved in the discussion and model as needed, but you will gradually release responsibility to them.
*For graphic organizers, see attachments (A1, A2, A3)
Activity #2: Writing Thick and Thin Questions
Good readers use questioning before, during, and after reading. There are different types of questions, including predicting questions; clarifying questions; wonder questions, author’s craft questions; typical “teacher questions” such as main idea, sequence, and cause and effect; and higher-order questions and evaluative questions such as “What would you do if” or “What if?” An answer to a question might be found right in the text (thin), or it might be more difficult to answer and need for you to infer and use clues to figure it out (thick).
Help students understand the difference in simple from-the-text questions vs. questions that require critical thinking. Teach students how to write higher-level questions. Teach them the difference in questions that have only one correct answer verses open-ended questions. Get the struggling students involved by writing questions yourself and giving to specific students before your lesson begins. Give them a cue for when you want them to ask the question you gave them. Other students will think they came up with the question on their own. Eventually, these students will be able to come up with their own questions after you have modeled this procedure several times.
As an activity, after reading a text, have the students write 3 thin questions and 3 thick questions. Trade questions with a partner to see if the partner can answer the questions.
Activity #3: Thinking Aloud and Jotting Down Questions on Post-It Notes
Today I’m going to show you the questions I have when I read. Some may be answered in the story and some may not. …As I read, I want you to notice what I am doing to comprehend what I read and how my questions help me to understand.
Model: As I read the title of this book, The Mary Celeste: An Unsolved Mystery from History, I already have a question: “What is the mystery?” As a matter of fact, it was that question that made me want to read the book. So I’m going to write my question on this Post-it and place it on the cover… (on 4th page, it says: The Mary Celeste is about a ship whose crew disappeared when they were on the high seas more than a hundred and twenty years ago. The crew was never found.) Oh, so that’s the mystery. My initial question was answered. But now I have another question – I wonder what happened to the crew? …
Guide, collaborate, and practice independently.
Activity #4: Anchor Charts Describing Strategies for Answering Questions
Allow students to brainstorm ideas of how to answer questions that arise when reading text. Ideas may include: keep reading, sometimes the answer is in the text; talk to a friend; use and share background knowledge; find new sources (do some research); use clues from the text to infer; class discussion. Etc.
Example: Anchor Chart for the text, First on the Moon, by Barbara Hehner
Questions: / Answers: / Strategies for Answering Questions:What’s wrong with the moon landing craft? / Nothing-said mission control / Read on the find the information
How will they be able to land if there are boulders? / They landed in a flat area so they avoided this problem. / Used clues from the text and inferred
Why do they have an American on their spacesuit?
Activity #5: I have, Who has?
*This activity is suitable for lower-level questioning where there is only one correct answer for each question. Teacher writes an answer on a card, plus a new question. She makes several cards and passes them out to students. She starts the process by asking a question. The child holding the card with correct answer will raise his hand and respond. He will then ask the question on his card. The child with the correct answer will raise his hand and respond and ask his new question. The game continues until all cards have been used.
Activity #6: Three-Level Study Guide (taken from Janet Allen’s More Tools for Teaching Content Literacy)
A Three-Level Study Guide is an instructional tool that guides students into higher levels of comprehension. The first asks students to consider questions at the literal level; the second is an interpretive level; and the third is an application level. The first 2 levels – literal and interpretive – give students the basis of information and understanding they can apply to other texts or new situations. The ultimate goal is for students to internalize the method so they no longer need the guide to deconstruct a complex text.
1. Level 1: Literal
As you create questions for this level, focus on the most important details in the text. They might be related to word knowledge, a sequence of events, knowledge of people involved, or information critical to comprehension. Question stems or prompts might include any of the following sentence starters:
a. Name
b. Describe
c. Choose
d. Select
e. State
f. List
g. Define
h. Observe
i. Match
2. Level 2: Interpretive
Questions at this level will focus students’ attention on using literal information to interpret events, infer motivations, determine causes and effects, predict consequences, or analyze situations. Some possible sentence starters to direct students’ thinking include:
a. Summarize
b. Compare
c. Find patterns
d. Classify
e. Organize
f. Question
g. Predict
h. Determine
3. Level 3: Application
At this level, students apply their literal and inferential knowledge to new situations or challenges. At this level, you first create a scenario in which students would apply their knowledge. Then you might ask them to create their own new version, imagine themselves in a different situation, solve a similar problem, or write/discuss alternative solutions or actions. Possible sentence starters to direct students on this level include:
a. Imagine
b. Create
c. What if
d. Plan
e. Evaluate
f. Solve
g. Hypothesize
h. Apply
As students work through these levels, they will begin to read more closely, effectively discriminate between important and minor ideas and information, and think more creatively and critically. A sample of the graphic organizer may look like this:
Three-Level Study Guide
Gathering, Recalling, and Noting InformationInferring Meaning from the Information
Applying Information to New Situations
Activity #7: Using the 5 Ws and H to Find Information (taken from Janet Allen’s More Tools…)
The 5 W’s and H are used to gain factual information about a topic. The template can be used to meet specific instructional purposes. In the example shown here, the organizer asks students to explore the text supports to build background knowledge prior to reading An American Plague: The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793. The teacher forms a question with each W and H to match her purpose. In this case, the teacher asked students to use the copyright page, visuals, map, index, title page, and chapter titles to uncover information and make predictions. Students can then revisit their responses after reading and add to their initial premises based on what they have learned from the text.
Using the 5 Ws and H to Find Information
Using Text Features to Answer the 5 Ws and H of An American Plague
Who / was involved or affected by the events?What / information do the title page and copyright page give us?
When / did the yellow fever epidemic begin?
Where / did it begin? Use the map and pictures.
Why / was chapter one titled “No One Noticed”?
How / can the index help us discover words we will need to write about this event?
Based on our discoveries from noting the text features, explain how text features in general help us uncover important information about a book’s topic.
Other ideas may be to use the 5 W’s and H to find information in the introduction, to find information in the pictures, etc. See the attachment for a blank template for this activity.
Activity #8: Learning Through Inquiry (taken from Janet Allen’s More Tools…)
Learning through inquiry can take many forms and can be the beginning of a lesson or the structure for your classroom. One way to make learning through inquiry an ongoing part of learning in any classroom is by offering students the opportunity to examine information from may perspectives. From this data, students can sort through facts and opinions and use them to form their own questions for reading, discussion, research, and writing. As students become involved in inquiry learning, their search and discovery lead them to deeper understandings and further questions they want answered. Rather than being fed names, dates, facts, and figures, students find their own facts and use these to formulate questions about the larger issues and big ideas that are part of comprehensive learning. Inquiry moves students from apathy and passivity to curiosity and action.
The following is an example of using inquiry as part of a study unit on Zoot Suit Riots in Los Angeles. Students were provided multiple resources to give them background information. From these sources, which are listed in the first column, they noted facts and opinions they gathered and entered them in the second and third columns. They then listed the questions they had about the event in the “This makes me wonder…” column. Those questions formed the basis of our reading, research, and discussion. See sample below:
Learning Through Inquiry
Origin of information/Who is the source? / What are the facts? / What are the opinions of this person? / This makes me wonder…
http://www.suavecito.
com/history.htm / Diaz died of blunt
head injury. It
could have been a
car accident.
Henry Leyvas, 20,
and 24 members of “38th Street gang”
were charged with
Diaz’ murder.
Henry Leyvas and”gang” not allowed to change clothers in
the entire two weeks pretrial. / “charged with such
things as…”
“…every single one
was a Spanish surnamed individual!”
No punishment for the
brutal beatings of the Mexican pachucos.
“…little consequences
for the rioters (servicemen and
local law enforcement) / Why were authorities
so anxious to charge the Zoot Suiters?
Why did authorities not get charged with any
crimes for the beatings of pachucos?
History textbook
http://www.pbs.ort/
wgbh/amex/zoot/
eng_filmmore/index.
Html
Murder at the
Sleepy Lagoon:
Zoot Suits, Race,
and Riot in
Wartime L.A.,
Eduardo Obregon
Pagan
See the attachment for a blank template for this activity.