Reciprocal Teaching

Reciprocal Teaching

What: Reciprocal teaching is a reading comprehension strategy that relies on a series of four explicit activities that are structured around reading aloud short passages of text and then dialoguing about the text in a small group by summarizing, questioning, clarifying, and predicting (Palinscar & Brown, 1984). Using a gradual release of responsibility model to explicitly train students in the four roles, the teacher as facilitator provides more scaffolding in the beginning and challenges each student at their ability level or just beyond, appealing to each student’s zone of proximal development (Palinscar & Brown, 1984; Slater & Horstman, 2002 ). Alfassi (2004) pairs the reciprocal teaching model with “direct explanation,” which reflects the “think-aloud” process. By explaining out loud and explicitly demonstrating the reasoning and thinking processes behind making meaning, including questioning, clarifying, summarizing, and predicting, students are able to practice and adopt the reciprocal teaching process as their own. Over time, students need less scaffolding and are more self-directed.

Why Effective? Palinscar and Brown (1984) found that adolescents trained in reciprocal teaching made significant gains in their reading comprehension across content areas. In addition, the comprehension skills practiced in a social context transferred to students’ independent reading. Through the use of extensive modeling, teachers make difficult to recognize comprehension-fostering and comprehension-monitoring activities visible for students, and developing readers eventually internalize the habits and processes of master readers (Carter, 1997; Palinscar & Brown, 1984). The technique is easily understood both for teachers and students, and the process reflects reading as a transaction with text, honoring a constructivist approach (Carter, 1997).

Resources:

• Graphic Organizer - All four roles defined with areas to jot down notes and questions
• Roles & Bookmarks - Graphic organizers, role cards, and bookmarks

References

Alfassi, Miriam. (2004). Reading to Learn: Effects of combined strategy instruction on high school students. Journal of Educational Research, 97(4), 171-184.

Boardman, A. G., Roberts, G., Vaughn., S., Wexler, J., Murray, C. S., & Kosanovich, M. (2008). Effective instruction for adolescent struggling readers: A practice brief. Portsmouth, NH: RMC Research Corporation, Center on Instruction.

Carter, Carolyn J. (1997). Why reciprocal teaching? Educational Leadership, 54(6), 64-68.

Joseph, Nancy. (2009). Metacognition Needed: Teaching middle and high school students to develop strategic learning skills. Preventing School Failure, 54(2), 99-103.

Palinscar, A., & Brown, A. (1984). Reciprocal teaching of comprehension-fostering and comprehension-monitoring activities. Cognition and Instruction, 1(2), 117-175.

Reciprocal Teaching. (n.d.). Retrieved March 1, 2018, from Reading Rockets website: http://www.readingrockets.org/strategies/reciprocal_teaching

Reciprocal Teaching in High School [Video file]. (2009). Retrieved from https://dwwlibrary.wested.org/resources/933

Rosenshine, B., Meister, C., & Chapman, S. (1996). Teaching students to generate questions: A review of the intervention studies. Review of Educational Research, 66(2), 181-221.

Slater, Wayne H., & Horstman, Franklin R. (2002). Teaching reading and writing to struggling middle school and high school students: The case for reciprocal teaching. Preventing School Failure, 46(4), 163-66.

Using Think-Alouds to Improve Reading Comprehension. (n.d.). Retrieved March 1, 2018, from Reading Rockets website: http://www.readingrockets.org/article/using-think-alouds-improve-reading-comprehension