Literacy Matters - Winter 2020

TYPE OF QUESTIONING EXAMPLE OF QUESTIONING Justification Questions or support for statements

What text evidence can back up that statement? Where in the material does it refer to …? Are there other views on the issue in the text? Talk more about that… What previous experience or understanding helped you answer in that way?

Clarification Questions or explanations for statements

Reading Matters Teaching Matters

Table 1 . Justification and clarification questions. Adapted from Building academic language: Essential practices for content classrooms (pp. 108-9), by J. Zwiers, 2008, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Copyright 2008 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

After students discuss content, using the prompt posters (see Figure 3) when needed, teachers can follow up with additional questions (see Table 1) that allow students to expand on their explanations and utilize oral, academic language and text evidence. Before engaging in this questioning, teachers should model how to answer justification, clarification, and elaboration questions so students feel comfortable trying it. Examples of justification and clarification questions and sentence starters can be viewed in Table 1. Peer Teaching as Culturally Responsive Practice Peer teaching can be accomplished in small groups or pairs and students are encouraged to document multiple representations of words (visual, verbal, movements; Bromley, 2007, p. 9). Movement, gesture, and body language are important for language learners and kinesthetic learners because the movement or activation of motor skills allows the brain to make connections between the new word and retrieval from memory (Macedonia & von Kriegstein, 2010). In addition to visual, verbal, and movement categories of the word, students are encouraged to discuss root word meanings and any youth culture uses or meanings of the term, and engage in multiple, meaningful exposures to the word. Hollie (2012) emphasizes the need to bridge and add on to students’ already established uses of language. Rather than introducing word as though it is a new word, for instance, students may already have sophisticated understandings of tier 2 vocabulary to which educators and other students can add meaning without introducing words as new terms. Graphic organizers can be used to help students document their prior knowledge and build on to it with additional suggestions, references, and examples offered by peers and teachers (see Table 2).

Figures 3. Hamilton Prompt Poster and Serial Prompt Poster. Adapted from Building academic language: Essential practices for content classrooms (p. 108), by J. Zwiers, 2008, San Francisco, CA: Jossey- Bass. Copyright 2008 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Literacy Matters | Volume 20 • Winter 2020 | scira.org | 47

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