Chapter 14 page 330
Regina: I do. I wonder what kind of special machinery
they have now.
Leann: I have a prediction to make.
Teacher: Good.
Leann: I think it might tell when salt was first
discovered; well, it might tell what salt is made
of and how it’s made.
Teacher: Okay, can we have another teacher?
questions, which is activity #2.Making predictions is activity #3.Now they switch to a new student as leader.In the example above, the teacher did not provide any specific feedback or other scaffolding. But when
students have difficulty applying the strategies, teachers step in to provide scaffolding. Here is an example
of a teacher helping a student who is having trouble formulating a question:
Text: Spinner’s mate is much smaller than she, and his body is dull brown. He spends most of his time sitting at
one side of her web.
Transcript Analysis
Carl: [His next task is to ask a question, but he is
unable to come up with a question]
Teacher: What’s this paragraph about?
Carl: Spinner’s mate. How do spinner’s mate....
Teacher: That’s good. Keep going.
Carl: How do spinner’s mate is smaller than....
How am I going to say that?
Teacher: Take your time with it. You want to ask a
question about spinner’s mate and what he
does, beginning with the word “how.”
Carl: How do they spend most of his time sitting?
Teacher: You’re very close. The question would be,
“How does spinner’s mate spend most of
his time?” Now, you ask it.
Carl: How does spinner’s mate spend most of his
time?
When the student cannot answer, the teacher
prompts the student to summarize. She begins
without giving any specific hint.
Carl starts a question but cannot complete it.
The teacher refrains still from giving a specific
hint, trying to allow Carl to do everything he
can do on his own.
Carl still struggles to formulate a question.Carl has shown that he needs more specific help,
so the teacher gives a more specific hint, but
still does not give him the answer.
Carl does as the teacher directs but is still not
very successful.
The teacher provides a model of a correct
answer, following the procedure she explained
earlier of starting the question with how. She
has Carl try saying it, too.
Carl is able to repeat the teacher’s model.Notice that the teacher tries to give Carl as little help as possible and gradually increases the level of help in
response to his difficulties. In the end, the teacher tells Carl more directly how to construct a question, and
when he needs still more help, she models for him how to formulate this question. Thus, the teacher puts
into practice the technique of trying to provide as little scaffolding as possible, but increasing the level of
support when needed.
Reciprocal teaching was originally designed for small-group reading instruction with the teacher
present. The examples above show the teacher engaged with small groups of students. However, Reciprocal
Teaching has also been used as a method of collaborative learning (De Corte et al., 2001; Lederer, 2000;
Rosenshine & Meister, 1994; van Garderen, 2004). Teachers work with the whole class to help students
learn to do Reciprocal Teaching on their own, and then students work in small groups to ask each other the
questions without the teacher present. The teacher goes around and helps groups but obviously can only be
with one group in the class at a time. Teachers can provide models and scaffolds either in whole-class
discussions or in the briefer times when they are working with particular groups.