Self-Questioning & Locating Information in Texts
Understanding a text at a deep level means thinking carefully about what you read and asking yourself questions before you read (I wonder ...); while you are reading and after you read the text. Self Questioning gets your brain ready to locate important information while you are reading. Being able to develop a good range of questions leads to a deeper understanding of what you read. Each type of question uses different strategies and skills to find or work out the answers.
If you know what kind of question it is, you can work out the correct strategy or skills to use to find the best answers.
We have looked at 3 types of questions and the different strategies to use to find or work out answers.
QUESTION TYPE:
The easiest type of question is a SKINNY question. These questions give you a small or SKINNY amount of information - usually short, sharp facts. The answer is always in the text.
STRATEGY FOR ANSWERING SKINNY QUESTIONS
Use the keywords or main ideas in the question, then find those keywords or words that mean the same (synonyms) in the text and the answer should be close by. These types of questions are also called 'RIGHT THERE questions because the answer is RIGHT THERE ON THE PAGE. Sometimes these questions are called LITERAL questions.
QUESTION TYPE:
The next type of question is called a CHUBBY question - sometimes they are called SEARCH AND THINK and AUTHOR AND ME questions. I call them Chubby questions because they give you a bit more detail and understanding than Skinny Questions so they are useful to help you get deeper into a text and understand it better.
STRATEGY FOR ANSWERING CHUBBY QUESTIONS
You won't find the answer directly in the text; you have to search for clues or hints sometimes in one part of the text and sometimes you have to put clues together from many parts of the text. Then you also need to THINK and make CONNECTIONS to WORK OUT YOUR OWN ANSWER. This is a skill called INFERRING and it is quite hard to do.
Remember CONNECTIONS are things in the text (can be the setting, characters, events, problems) that remind you of:
something that happened to you or someone you know - Text to Personal Connections
something in another text - Text to Text Connections
something in the real world or real life - Text to Real World Connections
When we make connections between what we are reading and remember similar things in our personal experience or life; another text or the real world, it helps us understand what we are reading much better. Connections help us THINK better and that helps us UNDERSTAND OR COMPREHEND better.
When you answer CHUBBY QUESTIONS, you MUST give your evidence or examples (CLUES) from the text and explain your reasons properly.
CHUBBY QUESTIONS TAKE WORK - USE YOUR BRAIN!!
QUESTION TYPE:
FAT QUESTIONS contain a lot of 'meat' or information, thinking and details. The answer is not in the text and neither are clues nor hints. You are ON YOUR OWN with finding the answers so they also need a lot of BRAIN WORK.
FAT QUESTIONS ask for your opinions, your ideas, your feelings so the text won't help you.
STRATEGY FOR ANSWERING FAT QUESTIONS
You need to really use Connections to help you work out a response (answer) and you MUST clearly explain the reasons for your opinion, ideas, feelings in detail. If you can use examples and connect your answer to something in the text (any evidence), it will help you explain yourself better.
PRACTICE
Let's practise discussing 'Fox' using the 3 different types of questions (Skinny, Chubby and Fat) and remember the different answer strategies. We will use a website called Today's Meet which is in an online (Internet-based) discussion forum.
Remember to be polite and respectful when using the internet just as you would in a face to face conversation. Remember to use CAPITAL LETTERS and ? for your questions. Try to spell correctly or at least sound out all phonemes. Let others have a go. Try to post one question and answer some questions too.
Make your questions ones that help us discuss some deep ideas.
Click on the link below to join the discussion.
If you know what kind of question it is, you can work out the correct strategy or skills to use to find the best answers.
We have looked at 3 types of questions and the different strategies to use to find or work out answers.
QUESTION TYPE:
The easiest type of question is a SKINNY question. These questions give you a small or SKINNY amount of information - usually short, sharp facts. The answer is always in the text.
STRATEGY FOR ANSWERING SKINNY QUESTIONS
Use the keywords or main ideas in the question, then find those keywords or words that mean the same (synonyms) in the text and the answer should be close by. These types of questions are also called 'RIGHT THERE questions because the answer is RIGHT THERE ON THE PAGE. Sometimes these questions are called LITERAL questions.
QUESTION TYPE:
The next type of question is called a CHUBBY question - sometimes they are called SEARCH AND THINK and AUTHOR AND ME questions. I call them Chubby questions because they give you a bit more detail and understanding than Skinny Questions so they are useful to help you get deeper into a text and understand it better.
STRATEGY FOR ANSWERING CHUBBY QUESTIONS
You won't find the answer directly in the text; you have to search for clues or hints sometimes in one part of the text and sometimes you have to put clues together from many parts of the text. Then you also need to THINK and make CONNECTIONS to WORK OUT YOUR OWN ANSWER. This is a skill called INFERRING and it is quite hard to do.
Remember CONNECTIONS are things in the text (can be the setting, characters, events, problems) that remind you of:
something that happened to you or someone you know - Text to Personal Connections
something in another text - Text to Text Connections
something in the real world or real life - Text to Real World Connections
When we make connections between what we are reading and remember similar things in our personal experience or life; another text or the real world, it helps us understand what we are reading much better. Connections help us THINK better and that helps us UNDERSTAND OR COMPREHEND better.
When you answer CHUBBY QUESTIONS, you MUST give your evidence or examples (CLUES) from the text and explain your reasons properly.
CHUBBY QUESTIONS TAKE WORK - USE YOUR BRAIN!!
QUESTION TYPE:
FAT QUESTIONS contain a lot of 'meat' or information, thinking and details. The answer is not in the text and neither are clues nor hints. You are ON YOUR OWN with finding the answers so they also need a lot of BRAIN WORK.
FAT QUESTIONS ask for your opinions, your ideas, your feelings so the text won't help you.
STRATEGY FOR ANSWERING FAT QUESTIONS
You need to really use Connections to help you work out a response (answer) and you MUST clearly explain the reasons for your opinion, ideas, feelings in detail. If you can use examples and connect your answer to something in the text (any evidence), it will help you explain yourself better.
PRACTICE
Let's practise discussing 'Fox' using the 3 different types of questions (Skinny, Chubby and Fat) and remember the different answer strategies. We will use a website called Today's Meet which is in an online (Internet-based) discussion forum.
Remember to be polite and respectful when using the internet just as you would in a face to face conversation. Remember to use CAPITAL LETTERS and ? for your questions. Try to spell correctly or at least sound out all phonemes. Let others have a go. Try to post one question and answer some questions too.
Make your questions ones that help us discuss some deep ideas.
Click on the link below to join the discussion.