Questioning the Author
Proficient readers ask themselves questions about a text. Asking and answering questions like "what's important here?" and "who's speaking now?" helps readers interact with the text and engage prior knowledge.
Source: Powerupwhatworks.org
Thinking Strategies - Deliberate and Challenge Questioning the Author.pdfResearch Notes
- This strategy assists students with developing meaning and mimicks the way competent readers build meaning from text. It does not wait for a more thorough reflection time and perceived understanding of the text before launching into discussions. Instead, the teacher poses Queries (open-ended prompts) to consider during the initial reading.
- Researchers in a Gr 4-5 study noticed that teachers asked more questions that focused on considering and extending rather than retrieving information.
- Teachers responded to students in ways that extended the conversation rather that evaluating or repeating the responses.
- Students did twice as much talking than they did in a traditional lesson.
- Students frequently initiated their own questions and comments in contrast to rarely doing so in traditional lessons.
- Students responded by talking about the meaning of what they read and by intergrating ideas rather than retrieving text information.
- In a study with Gr 6-7 students, it was noticed that students who participated in QTA recalled more from the selections they read and were better able to provide high-quality responses to interpretation questions after reading.
Source: Improving Comprehension with Questioning the Author by Isabel Beck and Margaret McKeown
Extending the Strategy
The effect size of Self-Verbalization and Self-Questioning based on John Hattie's research is 0.64.
Students can ask themselves three basic types of questions to support their reading comprehension. (See chart).
Students can respond by writing in the margins, adding notes to a document, creating a collaborative set of notes, recording their thoughts, creating a semantic map, or discussing with a partner.
Source: powerupwhatworks.org
ACSD Blog Post: Teaching Critical Reading with Questioning Strategies by Larry Lewin
This blog examines how to support Middle School students to become more critical readers. It refers to Sparking Starter Questions, inviting students to become Sidekicks of the author, and going from Curious to Suspicious Readers. There are practical examples of how these strategies were used in classrooms.
QTA worksheet - Deliberate and Challenge.pdf