Developing ELA Inference Reading Skills Through Technology: ELA Prep-Question Words

Many teachers are getting their students ready for the ELA which take place in New York State in Jan.

A few suggestions:

Provide students the following on their own laptop, in a small group on a computer, or as a whole class.

- Make sure each student knows what each question word asks. Have students word process all the different types of answers for each question. Or have them create a concept map using Inspiration. For example for “When” question word, they can write hour, day, month, year, season, after, before, during… Have them share their answers. Have students compile a list for each question word. Many students do not realize the breadth of possible answers to the question words.
-Have them word process three sentences that answer “When” in three different ways and then write the question for each. They might write “Yesterday I studied math. When did I study math? My brother goes skiing in December. When does my brother go skiing? I was born in 1985. When was I born?” Then the student trades laptops or the files with another student who answers the “When” question for each sentence.

-Have students brainstorm in a group all the variations on a question word. For example, for “When” they might list the following “At what time…?”, “During what season…?

- Have students use a blog to share all of their different questions that can be used to used each question word. Then ask students to read a passage and to write as many different questions as they can about the passage.

-Have student pairs read a passage and ask as many questions as they can about the passage. The pair exchanges the questions with another pair. Each pair answers the questions and they compare the different types of questions they asked and answered. They make sure the other pair correctly answered the questions.

How else have you helped your students to prepare for understanding and answering questions words?

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Education with Technology Harry G. Tuttle