Questions Before, During, and After Reading

How Can You Stretch Students' Thinking?

The best way to stretch students' thinking about a text is to help them ask increasingly challenging questions. Some of the most challenging questions are "Why?" questions about the author's intentions and the design of the text. For example:

"Why do you think the author chose this particular setting?"
"Why do you think the author ended the story in this way?"
"Why do you think the author chose to tell the story from the point of view of the daughter?"
"What does the author seem to be assuming about the reader's political beliefs?"

Another way to challenge readers is to ask them open-ended question that require evidence from the text to answer. For example:

"What does Huck think about girls? What is your evidence?"
"Which character in the story is most unlike Anna? Explain your reasons, based on evidence from the novel?"
"What is the author's opinion about affirmative action in higher education? How do you know?"

Be sure to explicitly model your own challenging questions while reading aloud a variety of texts, including novels, subject-area textbooks, articles, and nonfiction. Help students see that answering challenging questions can help them understand text at a deeper level, ultimately making reading a more enjoyable and valuable experience.

As students become proficient in generating challenging questions, have them group the questions the time they were asked (before, during or after reading). Students can determine their own categories, justify their reasons for placing questions into the categories, and determine how this can help their reading comprehension.

When Can You Use It?

Reading/English

Students who have similar interests can read the same text and meet to discuss their thoughts in a book club. Members can be given a set of sticky notes to mark questions they have before, during, and after reading the text. Members can then share their question with one another to clarify understanding within their group. Since students' reading level may not necessarily determine which book club they choose to join, accommodations may need to be made, including buddy reading, audio recordings of the text, or the use of computer-aided reading systems.

Writing

Good writers anticipate their readers' questions. Have students jot down the questions they will attempt to answer in an essay or short story before they write it, in the order that they plan to answer them. Stress that this should not be a mechanical process – as students write they probably will think of additional questions to ask and answer. The key point is to have students think of themselves as having a conversation with the reader – and a big part of this is knowing what questions the reader is likely to ask.

Math

Students can ask questions before, during, and after solving a math problem. Have students think aloud or write in groups to generate questions to complete performance tasks related to mathematics.

Social Studies

Use before, during, and after questions when beginning a new chapter or unit of study in any social studies topic. Select a piece of text, and have students generate questions related to the topic. At the end of the unit of study, refer back to the questions and discuss how the questions helped students to understand the content.

Science

Use before, during, and after questions to review an article or science text. You can discuss articles related to a recent scientific discovery with students and then generate questions that would help them to focus their attention on important information.

Lesson Plans

Lesson Plan: Questioning, The Mitten

This lesson is designed to introduce primary students to the importance of asking questions before, during, and after listening to a story. In this lesson, using the story The Mitten by Jan Brett, students learn how to become good readers by asking questions. This is the first lesson in a set of questioning lessons designed for primary grades.

Lesson Plan: Questioning, Grandfather's Journey

This lesson is for intermediate students using the strategy with the book, Grandfather's Journey, by Allen Say.

Lesson Plan: Questioning, Koko's Kitten

This lesson is designed to establish primary students' skills in asking questions before, during, and after they listen to a story. You can help students learn to become better readers by modeling how and when you ask questions while reading aloud the true story, Koko's Kitten, by Dr. Francine Patterson. This is the second lesson in a set of questioning lessons designed for primary grades.

Lesson Plan: Asking Pre-Reading Questions

This is a language arts lesson for students in grades 3-5. Students will learn about asking questions before reading and will make predictions based on the discussion of the questions.

Lesson Plan: Asking Questions When Reading

In this lesson, the teacher will read The Wall by Eve Bunting with the purpose of focusing on asking important questions. The students and the teacher will then categorize the questions according to the criteria for each.