Learning to Question

Principles of Comprehension and Learning: Processes that Enable Divergent Readings in the Text

As has been discussed in previous posts, there is no one "right" reading of a text; every reading transaction involves the text, the reader, and the meaning that the reader creates, and instruction across the content areas must account for that varied text comprehension by being student-centered with a focus on language immersion, critical thinking, problem-posing and metacognition.  The transactional model of teaching advocated by the authors encourages students to construct knowledge for themselves through active problem posing, interactive strategies, collaboration and reciprocal teaching and learning. 

Here is a jarring fact for teachers everywhere:  "Linguists speculate that the average adult increases his or her vocabulary by a third after leaving school."  Imagine!  All those vocabulary quizzes and written definitions, yet the way that we best learn new vocabulary is through the natural processes of being immersed in meaningful activity.  If students are given a reason for learning new words or concepts, then the student will be better able to make meaning of it, for after all, "words have the power to express our thoughts and manipulate our ideas."  A large part of this learning process involves schema theory, and the reorganization of what we already knew to incorporate what we now know.  One strategy to help in this process includes List-Group-Label, in which students are asked to brainstorm words and create groupings using those words, then revisit their categories in order to create more meaningful relationships between the words.

Critical Thinking & Question-Asking

Many of us are familiar with Bloom's Taxonomy, which is sometimes criticized for its hierarchical approach to ways of knowing or its lack of affective response, but it is still a valuable tool.  An associated idea is cubing, an activity that asks students to define an object using multiple perspectives.  For instance, consider asking health education students to examine the "cardiovascular system" using each of the following steps:

1. Describe it.
2. Compare it.
3. Associate it.
4. Analyze it.
5. Apply it.
6. Argue for or against it.

This activity could be made into a game using a die with each side labeled with one of the steps and could be used in any content area (consider using this strategy as a review game before a unit test).

Related to these approaches is Herber and Vacca's three levels of questioning, including the literal level, the interpretive level, and the applied level.  Encouraging students to learn how to ask their own questions at higher levels of thinking is helpful in developing metacognitive strategies, and can also help students to study using either SQ3R (outlined below) or PORPE (Predict potential questions, Organize the information, Rehearse through recitation and self-testing, Practice through writing, Evaluate for accuracy).

Students can be encouraged to ask questions using whole-class discussion, small groups, think-pair-share, individual journal writing, conferences with one or two students, student projects where students ask their own research questions, and student-run debates.