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filled in with questions about what happened in the story, such as “How did Timmy feel
when he opened the door?” or “What did Jen do after she came home?” There is a need for
questions that will connect the students knowledge from one part of the text to another or
from this texts to other texts that they have read. You should try to add questions that would
help students make such connections.Reciprocal teaching. Reciprocal teaching, which we discussed at length in Chapter 14 as a way of
helping students improve their reading comprehension strategies, can also be used as a collaborative
learning method. Unlike scripted cooperation, PALS, and guided peer questioning, reciprocal teaching is
typically used with groups of three or more. When reciprocal teaching is used as a collaborative reasoning
format, students work in groups of three or four. Students take turns being the leader, just as they do in the
teacher-led reciprocal teaching that we discussed in Chapter 15. The students all read the same passage.
Reciprocal teaching employs guided questioning in that the leader centers the discussion around four
questions. The leader summarizes the passage and then asks a question based on the passage. The leader
asks for or makes a prediction and invites questions of clarification. There is evidence that reciprocal
teaching is effective at promoting growth in reading comprehension when used as a collaborative learning
method (Rosenshine & Meister, 1994). Reciprocal teaching also illustrate that guided questioning methods
can be used with groups larger than pairs.
Pedagogy 15.8. Understanding Students' Thinking: A pair discussion using guided peer
questioning
Here is a pair of fifth graders using guided peer questioning. They are discussing an earth science
topic, tide zones, from their science textbook. Evaluate the quality of the students’ interaction.Katie: How are the upper tide zone and the lower tide zone different?
Janelle: They have different animals in them. Animals in the upper tide zone and splash
zone can handle being exposed—have to be able to use the rain and sand and wind
and um—and they don’t need that much water and the lower tide zone animals do.
Katie: And they can be softer ‘cause they don’t have to get hit on the rocks.
Janelle: Also predators. In the spray zone it’s because there’s predators like us people and
all different kinds of stuff that can kill the animals and they won’t survive, but the
lower tide zone has not as many predators.
Katie: But wait! Why do the animals in the splash zone have to survive?(From A. King, 1999, p. 97)Response. Katie begins by asking a connection question (How are ___ and ___ different?). Janelle
replies with an elaborated answer. Then Katie builds on Janelle’s ideas (co-construction) by noting
another characteristic of the lower tide zone animals. Janelle builds on the list of differences that
she and Katie are jointly constructing. In the last line, Katie makes a implicit critique—questioning
the idea implicit in Janelle’s comments about the survival of the animals in the splash zone. In
sum, Katie and Janelle use high-level strategies in this discussion, particularly elaboration. There is
strong uptake of ideas as students discuss each others’ comments using both co-construction and
critiques.