Promote thinking skills through Q.A.R

What do students mean when they say “I understand.”? I often ask students “Do you understand the text?” and they usually answer with a “Yes.” However, when they are asked to explain by giving examples, it is usually challenging for some of them to articulate their thoughts or identify details from the text to support their opinions and ideas. Occasionally, there might be new students joining in my Mandarin class during the school year. They often told me that they have been learning Mandarin for X number of years, but they are not able to read or don’t even know how to form questions. Learning how to ask good questions and searching for answers is such an important skill for students to develop. The questioning process not only provides students with an opportunity to test their understanding of what they read, but also allows them to exchange information and learn more from discussions. 

Being bilingual is not just about being able to speak an additional language. It also means that second language learners should be bi-literate and bi-cultural. Students need to be taught explicitly how to monitor their understanding of the texts in the target language. Most importantly, in order for transformative language learning and intercultural understanding to happen, they must learn how to ask high order thinking questions to connect with the author, the text, and their own experience. Learning questioning techniques enables students to develop their thinking skills and help them refine their language skills as they are constantly asked to extend their responses by providing examples and/or details. This is also a great formative assessment tool for teachers to monitor students’ level of understanding of the content through reading and thus enhance the inquiry-based learning. We must equip students with strategies and teach them how to read on the lines, read between the lines, and read beyond the lines. 

Q.A.R stands for Question－Answer Relationship. In my opinion, it is an effective reading strategy to help students take a deep dive into the reading texts by asking questions and providing answers. Questions are categorized into four different types and levels: Right There, Think and Search, Author and Me and On my own. There are different levels of thinking skills applied in this process. It is not uncommon for MYP language B teachers to spend hours and hours just to design a reading comprehension task. I have found that by using QAR strategy and follow some of the question prompts makes it easier and less time consuming. Additionally, using QAR questions to design reading comprehension tasks allows me to address all the strands required for the criterion of reading.