Your job is to involve the students in your group by thinking and talking about the section of the book you have just read. You are going to ask questions that really help the students in your group think about the reading. Your questions should require students to discuss their interpretations of the text and connect background experience and knowledge with the text. You want all students involved in the discussion and talking about issues that come up during the reading.
Your job as the Discussion Director is to come up with ____ thinking questions. You really want to make your group think about what you all have just read. You are trying to make sure everyone in your group understands or comprehends the reading. It is very important that you ask your group fat, juicy, thinking questions and not easy, right there, in the book questions. Remember you may wish to begin your questions with the following words/phrases:
Who?, What?, Where?, When?, Why?, How?, If_______ then________?
Your teacher really wants you to help the students in your group to go back to the book to find their answers if they don’t know them. So, to help this run very smoothly, you need to write down the questions, your answers to your questions, and the page numbers where the students can reference the text to justify their responses to your questions. Your teacher will tell you how many questions and what types of questions you need to ask.
**********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
Your teacher hopes that after giving you examples of questions, that you will eventually be able to come up with excellent questions on your own.
Here are several examples of the kinds of questions you may want to ask:
MCEOG (Multiple Choice End of Grade Question)
Which of the following best describes ______________
You may choose to give a fact from the story and have the group share an opinion about your fact, or you may read some sentences and see if the group can guess whether they are fact or opinion, or your teacher may ask you to find a fact and an opinion from the reading.
Remember: A fact is true and you can prove it! An opinion is something you think or feel but it cannot be proven.
Problem/Solution
What was ____________’s problem on p._________ or in Chapter_______? How did ________ solve his/her problem? How do you predict _________will solve his/her problem? How would you solve ________’s problem?
Effect/Cause or Cause/Effect
The effect tells what happened. The cause tells why it happened. For example: The girl ran into the door because she did not look where she was going. Effect: The girl ran into the door. Cause: She did not look where she was going.
When you are asking an effect/cause question, you can tell your group the effect and have them guess the cause.
Characterization (give words to describe characters and find evidence from the book that proves those are the traits; also, think about how the character has changed over time and the character's relationships with other characters)
Hero (good guy)
Heroine ( good girl hero)
Villain ( bad guy)
Setting (where and when the story takes place)
Compare/Contrast (alike/different)
Main Idea (the most important idea from this section)
Theme/Moral (a lesson learned about life)
Plot (the main events of the story including the problem and solution)
Sequence (the order of events)
Genre (fantasy, historical fiction, folktale, fairytale, tall tale, biography, informational, poetry, realistic fiction)
Italics (look for words written in italics and be able to explain why they are italicized)
Point of View ( who is telling the story)
Mood (What mood is the author trying to create? How does it make you feel?)
Figurative Language
Simile (compares two unlike things using the words like or as: My hands are like ice. My hands are as cold as ice.)
Metaphor (compares two unlike objects: My hands are ice. )
Personification (gives human/person traits to non-human things.)
How to Discuss the role of Discussion Director
Your job is to involve the students in your group by thinking and talking about the section of the book you have just read. You are going to ask questions that really help the students in your group think about the reading. Your questions should require students to discuss their interpretations of the text and connect background experience and knowledge with the text. You want all students involved in the discussion and talking about issues that come up during the reading. Also, it is very important that students understand that their contributions to the discussion are important and valued.
1. You begin by asking your first question. Be sure to give the students in your group enough “wait time” before you actually begin the discussion. You may have times where the students in your group are not sure of what to say, so you may need to think about providing hints or clues to the passage where they may reference the paragraph and/or page.
2. As you lead the discussion, you may want to model for the other students how to politely make a point by entering the discussion with comments such as:
Excuse me …
I’d like to add …
I disagree because …
I agree because …
I don’t understand what you mean …
I’m confused about …
I’d like to expand on that …
What made you say …
That reminds me of ….
3. You should think of yourself as playing many different roles:
· Acceptor- one who accepts a response as reasonable and appropriate because the response has been justified or explained:
“That makes sense… I can understand why you would say that… I never thought about that before, but now I understand.”
· Catalyst- one who moves the discussion in a new direction or initiates a new idea:
“What if we thought about ____________from _________’s point of view?
· Challenger- one who challenges a comment or answer by asking the student to justify his/her response:
“How do you know…? Why did you say…? What made you say…? Why do you think that?”
· Defender- one who justifies or defends an interpretation:
“I think…. because…” “I agree…. because…”
· Clarifier- one who gets the student to elaborate if you are unsure of his/her response:
“Are you saying … Would you tell us more about why you think that is so? In your own words, explain the issue. What evidence can you find to support…Tell me more about… What do you mean…?”
· Connector- one who gets the students to connect the book to their own lives, others’ lives, or other books or characters:
“This story makes me think of … This reminds me of … If I were _______, I would…”
· Inquisitor- one who questions ideas or wonders:
“ I wonder why…What if …What about …”
4. You may need to help students in your group:
* focus on supporting ideas and opinions
* disagree politely
* listen with their eyes and ears on the speaker
* reference the text for justifying or supporting ideas
* predict what will happen next
* relate to other books or characters as well as their own lives