「作者質疑法」對台灣國中生閱讀動機與閱讀理解力的影響

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(1)國立臺灣師範大學英語學系碩士論. 文. Master’s Thesis Department of English National Taiwan Normal University. 「作者質疑法」對台灣國中生閱讀動機與閱讀理解力的影響. Effects of Questioning the Author on Reading Motivation and Reading Comprehension of Junior High School Students in Taiwan 指導教授：朱錫. 琴. Advisor: Dr. Hsi-Chin Chu 研究生：朱子. 昀. Tzu-Yun Chu. 中華民國一百零四年六月. 06, 2015.

(2) 中文摘要這項研究的目的是探討作者質疑法（QTA）對台灣國中學生在閱讀動機和閱讀理解方面的影響。作者質疑法是一種教學方式，它邀請讀者與文本對話，自己建立文本涵義，並挑戰作者。該方法是基於作者並非不會犯錯的假設，並使用詢問及閱讀中的討論，以促進文本的涵義建構。在台灣中部的一所國中裡，兩班共 61 位八年級學生參加了這項持續七週的研究。其中一個由 29 位學生組成的班級為實驗組，接受 QTA 方法學習閱讀五個故事，而其他 32 位學生為對照組，則接受傳統方法學習相同的五個故事。在教學活動的前一週和後一週，兩組學生皆填寫閱讀動機問卷（MRQ），閱讀一個故事，並進行回想和回應寫作。此外，QTA 組另於後測後填寫感知問卷。量化之測量工具反映出 QTA 不同的效果。首先在閱讀動機方面，利用前測作為共變量和組別作為獨立變量的 ANCOVA 分析，在 MRQ 問卷中所有項目作為一個整體的結果顯示 QTA 對於閱讀動機並無顯著影響。其次，在回想寫作中，學生的寫作內容被歸類為文本直接回想的單位以及推理位，而在前者部分， QTA 並未顯示出其對於學生記憶文本內容的效果。然而，我們間接發現 QtA 正面作用在學生對於文本的推理上；對照組在前測中表現較實驗組為突出，然而在後測時反而未能有好表現。第三，在回應寫作方面，我們從開放式編碼中發現四種類型的回應：語言上的評論，內容上的評論，基於文本的回應和以讀者為基礎的回應。將每種類型在前後測中所佔的比例予以計算之，結果發現，相較於前測，在後測時，QTA 組在以讀者為基礎的回應之比例上有顯著的增加，且在語言上的評論比例則急遽下降，而控制組則未顯示出這些現象。而在內容上的評論和基於文本的回應此兩項回應方面，兩組間並無差異。此外，質性的感知問卷分析反映出大致上學生對於此教學法以及教材皆持正面態度。這項研究的結果顯示出 QTA 教學法在台灣的國中閱讀教學方面具有可行. i.

(3) 性，尤其透過其提升學生推理能力及回應的效果，學生於閱讀時的注意力將從語言解碼轉移至文本涵義之建構。. 關鍵詞：作者質疑法，閱讀動機，回想，推理，回應寫作，以讀者為基礎的回應，基於文本的回應. ii.

(4) ABSTRACT. The aim of this study is to probe the effects of Questioning the Author (QtA) on the reading motivation and reading comprehension of junior high school students in Taiwan. Questioning the Author is a teaching approach which invites readers to have conversations with the text, to build up meanings one their own, and to challenge the author. The approach is formulated based on the assumption that the author is not infallible and thus uses queries and during-reading discussions to facilitate meaning construction.. Sixty-one eighth graders in two classes in a junior high school in central Taiwan participated in this study in seven weeks. One class of twenty-nine students formed the experimental group, who were guided through five stories using QtA approach, while the other, of thirty-two students, formed the control group, who were taught the same five stories using traditional approach. In the pretest and posttest weeks, prior to and after the five-week treatment, students in both groups filled out a Motivations for Reading (MRQ) questionnaire, read one story, and performed a recall and response writing for the story. Additionally, the QtA group responded to a perception questionnaire in the posttest.. iii.

(5) The quantitative measures reflected disparate QtA effects. First, for reading motivation, ANCOVA analyses, with pretest as a covariate and group as an independent variable, on the MRQ questionnaire items as a whole showed no significant effect of QtA treatment on reading motivation. Secondly, for written recall, which was coded into units of text retention and units of inference, no significant effect was found for QtA approach in text retention. Nevertheless, positive effect, albeit indirect, was found on the inferences generated in recall; the control group significantly outperformed the experimental group in the pretest yet showed no such excel in the posttest. Thirdly, for response writing, four types of response were emerged from open-coding: comment on language, comment on content, text-based response and reader-based response; for each type of response in the pre- and posttests, a proportion was calculated. It was found that in comparison with pretest, at posttest, QtA group has a remarkable increase in the proportion of reader-based response and a drastic drop in comment on language, which were not revealed by the control group. As for comment on content and text-based response, no such gap was found between groups. In addition, qualitative analysis on perception questionnaire reflected that students in general held a positive attitude toward the approach as well as the materials. The results of this study suggested the feasibility of QtA approach in supporting the reading instruction at junior high schools in Taiwan, especially via its functions of boosting inference making and response generation, and as such, diverting attention from language decoding to meaning construction.. Key words: Questioning the Author, reading motivation, recall, inference making, response writing, reader-based response, text-based response iv.

(6) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS. First of all, I would like to express my gratitude to my research adviser, Professor Chu His-chin, for her support and encouragement. When I encountered difficulty in conducting this research, Professor Chu always provided me with valuable opinions, and found solutions for me. Without Professor Chu, I would have given up this complicated research. Also, I would like to thank Professor Cheng Yuh-show and Professor Huang Shu-chen for their precious advice and suggestions for the design of this study. When planning the methodology and test materials, I neglected several important elements; it was Professor Cheng and Professor Huang who reminded me to take heed. In addition, I would also like to show my gratitude to one of my colleagues, Wu Hsiao-han, and a classmate from my graduate school, Kao Yuan-chen. These two friends contributed to this study by being my co-raters for the writing sheets. Without them, I would not have obtained the scoring reliability. Besides, there were two native speakers who helped me establish the factual pausal unit system. I would also like to express my appreciation to them. Last but not least, I would like to show my deepest gratitude to my mother-in-law for taking care of my baby daughter when I was engaged in thesis writing. Since I am a career woman, my mother-in-law looks after my daughter during daytime. Yet when I am home and need time to work on my thesis, it is still she that tells me to bring my daughter to her. She is the one who supported me all the way through. Of course, I also need to thank my husband, who always cheers me up when I feel frustrated. Without his encouragement, I would have quitted my writing. Thank you all, with all my heart.. v.

(7) TABLE OF CONTENTS. ABSTRACTS .......................................................................................................... iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................... v TABLE OF CONTENTS .......................................................................................... vi CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION ........................................................................ 1 Background and Motivation............................................................................... 1 Purpose of the Study and Research Questions .................................................... 5 Definition of Terms............................................................................................ 6 Questioning the Author (QtA): ................................................................... 6 Factual pausal units: ................................................................................... 6 Inferences: ................................................................................................. 7 Responsive thought units: .......................................................................... 7 Motivation: ................................................................................................ 7 Significance of the Study ................................................................................... 7 Organization of the Study .................................................................................. 8 CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................. 9 Theoretical Background ..................................................................................... 9 The Current Comprehension Theories ........................................................ 9 Theories about Motivation ....................................................................... 14 Questioning and Comprehension .............................................................. 18 Questioning the Author .................................................................................... 19 Assumptions of QtA ................................................................................ 19 QtA and Its Six Features .......................................................................... 21 Techniques of QtA ................................................................................... 24 Previous Studies on QtA .................................................................................. 28 Potential Impacts of QtA on the Comprehension and ....................................... 31 Motivation of EFL Students ............................................................................. 31 CHAPTER THREE: METHODLOLGY ................................................................. 33 Pilot Study ....................................................................................................... 33 Assessing Reading Material in the Pilot Study ......................................... 33 Implementing Treatment .......................................................................... 34 Main Study ...................................................................................................... 36 Participants .............................................................................................. 36 Selection and Development of Teaching Material ..................................... 36 Test Materials for Pre / Posttest ................................................................ 39 Treatment Procedure ................................................................................ 42 vi.

(8) Procedure for Control Group (hereafter Group C) .................................... 48 Data Collection ................................................................................................ 49 Design for the Pretest and the Posttest ...................................................... 49 Data Collection Procedure........................................................................ 50 Scoring .................................................................................................... 51 Data Analysis........................................................................................... 54 CHAPTER FOUR: RESULTS................................................................................. 56 Effects of QtA Lessons on Comprehension ...................................................... 56 Effects of QtA Lessons on Text Retention ................................................ 56 Effects of QtA Lessons on Reading Motivation................................................ 66 Results of the Students’ Perception of QtA....................................................... 67 Perceptions of QtA Lessons ..................................................................... 67 Oral Feedbacks from Control Group ........................................................ 75 CHAPTER FIVE: DISCUSSION AND IMPLICATION ......................................... 77 Discussion ....................................................................................................... 78 QtA and Reading Comprehension ............................................................ 78 QtA and Reading Motivation.................................................................... 81 Students’ Perceptions of QtA Lessons ...................................................... 82 Pedagogical Implications ................................................................................. 84 Limitations and Implications for Further Studies.............................................. 85 On treatment duration .............................................................................. 86 Implication for treatment material ............................................................ 86 On measurement ...................................................................................... 87 Conclusion ...................................................................................................... 87 References .............................................................................................................. 89 APPENDICES ........................................................................................................ 90 Appendix A Consent Form ............................................................................ 90 Appendix B Pretest-Posttest Reading Materials ............................................ 91 Appendix C The recall and feedback sheet for pretest and posttest ................ 93 Appendix D An Example of Queries Discussed in a Treatment Story ............ 94 Appendix E Motivations for Reading Questionnaire (MRQ) (Original English Version) ........................................................................................................... 98 Appendix F Motivations for Reading Questionnaire (MRQ) (Adapted Version) .......................................................................................................................100 Appendix G Motivations for Reading Questionnaire (MRQ) (Chinese Version) .......................................................................................................................102 Appendix H Sample Reading (Include All Treatment Stories and Queries)...105 Appendix I Comprehension Checks for Treatment stories ............................ 112 vii.

(9) Appendix J The Pretest and Posttest Stories with Pausal Unit System .......... 118 Appendix K. The Perception Questionnaire for QtA (English version) ..........120. Appendix L The Perception Questionnaire for QtA (Chinese version) ..........121. viii.

(10) LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES Table 1.Information about the treatment material ................................................. 37 Table 2.Data on passages used in pretest and posttest .......................................... 40 Table 3.The Aspects on Which the Queries in A Missing Man Found focus ......... 44 Table 4.A Comparison of Schedules between Group E and Group C ................... 48 Table 5.The counter-balance design for pretest and posttest ................................. 50 Table 6.Data Collection Procedure for Pre /Posttest of Both Groups .................... 51 Table 7.Mean percentage in the pretest and adjusted mean percentage of recall units in posttest .............................................................................................. 57 Table 8.ANCOVA on mean percentage of recalled units ...................................... 58 Table 9.Mean number of inference units in pretest and posttest recall .................. 59 Table 10.Kolmogorov-Smirnov Z test on scores of interpretive thought units ...... 59 Table 11.Frequency and percentage of units of Four types of response in Response writing ................................................................................................. 63 Table 12.Mean Scores for Group and Pre-Posttest on MRQ................................. 66 Table 13.ANCOVA on MRQ ............................................................................... 67 Table 14.Students’ comments on their favorite and disfavored processes of QtA (Q.2) .................................................................................................... 69 Table 15.Students’ perception of QtA materials and techniques (Q.4) .................. 70 Table 16.Students’ perception of QtA impacts on English reading motivation (Q.5) ............................................................................................................ 72 Table 17.Students’ perception of QtA impacts on English reading comprehension (Q.6) .................................................................................................... 74. Figure 1.Percentage of each response type for Group E ....................................... 65 Figure 2.Percentage of each response type for Group C ....................................... 65. ix.

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(12) CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION Being a junior high school teacher for several years, I have been looking for teaching strategies that have the potential to facilitate students' reading comprehension as well as to create interesting English classes so as to boost students' motivation for reading. In order to achieve these two goals, I have also been frequently trying new ways to teaching reading since reading forms a core in junior high curriculum. Previous reading research also provided the researcher fresh ideas about how to guide a reading lesson. This current study is designed to explore whether a new teaching strategy focusing on questioning the intent of the author and discussions to integrate readers’ knowledge and experience with text content will improve students’ reading comprehension and whether it increases their reading motivation.. Background and Motivation Reading has become one of the most important human activities. We are exposed to reading all the time, from newspaper reading to e-mail reading. People tend to acquire information from different resources of reading materials. These reading materials are viewed as media between what the writers try to convey and what the readers activate from their knowledge reservoir to make sense of text. With the prevalence of Communicative Language Teaching, language teachers have often been advised to expose their learners to authentic materials, i.e. the materials produced by native speakers of a given language for native readers, as these materials are viewed as more “interesting, engaging, culturally enlightening, relevant 1.

(13) and motivating (Day & Bamford, 1998, p.54). However, the use of authentic materials may bring difficulties for learners with less proficiency, which may further result in learning frustration. As Nuttall (1996) argued, linguistically difficult texts are likely to result in the use of translation and hence are not suitable for developing reading skills. In order to overcome this problem, teachers have two choices: they can either modify the texts or engage learners in meaningful interaction with texts (Sasan Baleghizadeh, 2011). In this study, my focus will be on the later act to overcome the linguistic difficulty of the texts; namely, to engage learners with meaningful interaction with texts. Such interaction might boost the reading motivation of readers with texts, since studies also show that reading motivation is highly related to the amount of engagement during reading process (Schiefele, Schaffner, Moller, & Wigfield, 2012). The need to engage readers in reading is especially critical for EFL junior high readers in Taiwan. According to the researcher’s teaching experience, a so-called M-shaped distribution of English proficiency levels is frequently manifested in junior high school classrooms. While students on the peak at the higher end of the M shape might “enjoy” the reading as well as to understand the texts, students on the lower-end peak might be sitting in their seats without paying attention to the class activities, not to mention to the texts. All these students do is waiting for the bell rings so that they may enjoy the break time. The reasons for these students’ lack of motivation can vary from student to student. Some of them might be lacking decoding skills, while others with good decoding skills might not find a good way to learn yet. Since the class is composed of students with various proficiency levels and learning motivation, teachers’ intent to involve everyone in class does not seem to be an easy task. As what I've observed in my own classes, I found that reading comprehension and motivation can be somehow related. For students with lower proficiency level, it's 2.

(14) difficult to comprehend the texts introduced to them, which in turn decreases their motivation to read, or even, to learn from the course, since they cannot get a sense of achievement from the reading process. Hence, it becomes teachers' responsibilities to illuminate the reading class with teaching strategies (Baker, Dreher, & Guthrie, 2000; Kucan & Beck, 1997) and make the reading process less stressful and more enjoyable, so that we may re-establish students' confidence in themselves in terms of reading abilities. Being faced with the problem mentioned above, teachers have been trying various ways to solve them. Among these methods, grammar translation method (GTM) is sometimes applied in junior high schools in Taiwan. During the process, teachers explain everything important in detail, hoping that students can find the texts more comprehensible. But still, students have a hard time getting the main idea from the reading (Beck, McKeown, Hamilton, & Kucan, 1997). In addition to the ineffectiveness of this method, the application of GTM also seems boring and unable to arouse students’ learning motivation. The students may only get the explicit or literal meaning of the text without reading between the lines (Kintsch, 2004). The reading is taught by analyzing text parts, without actual integrative use, and thus the readers may not relate their experience and knowledge to the text. When the link between the text and the readers is weak, it is natural that readers will not be intrinsically motivated to read. As a result, the low motivation can lead to low level of reading comprehension (Guthrie, Wigfield, Metsala, & Cox, 1999; Schiefele at. al, 2012). To compensate for the lack of either comprehensions or motivation for these kinds of readers, sound instructional procedure that guides students to become able readers (Pressley, 2000), to interact with authors (Beck et al., 1997) and to enjoy English reading becomes extremely crucial. One of the instructional procedures to cope with the issues discussed above is 3.

(15) Questioning (Cairney, 1990; Dillon, 1988; Pearson & Johnson, 1978; Penticoff, 2002; James & Carter, 2006). Teachers have been using questioning as a mode of teaching, learning and assessing students' understanding of texts (Pressley, 2000). Caram and Davis (2005) proposed that humans are always searching for answers to our questions about the world because we are thirsty for knowledge all the time. On the other hand, since the love of reading may arouse an innate curiosity to generate questions and in turn trigger a desire to search into texts for meaning, questioning is considered a valuable tool to stimulate student learning (Caram & Davis, 2005). Through the process of questioning, teachers are able to check students’ understanding of basic knowledge about the text and even trigger their critical thinking, and classroom discussions are thus stimulated. (Penticoff, 2002; Raphael & Pearson, 1982; Raphael, Wonnacott, & Pearson, 1983). However, traditional type of questioning applied in teaching is often confined to retrieving. answers. directly. from. the. texts.. Besides,. it. usually. prompts. teacher-to-student interactions only instead of students' mutual interactions (Beck & McKeown, 1993). In order to bridge the gap, Beck & McKeown proposed another mode of questioning method: “Questioning the Author” (QtA). During the process of QtA, instead of teachers' taking the responsibility of raising questions all the time, students frequently initiate their own questions and comments. In addition, student-to-student interactions are developed during discussions. The teacher's role switches to a "facilitator," helping students to "construct meaning" for the texts. As the teacher and the students are involved in the discussion, they cooperate with one another to build understanding. These functions of QtA may in turn increase learners’ engagement in the process of reading. In addition, with QtA, learners are given “a reviser’s eye,” which emphasizes on the fallibility of authors, and are therefore more confident to read, since the reading comprehension is no longer the readers’ own 4.

(16) responsibility, but the authors are also responsible for making their writings understood (McKeown, 1993). Studies show that QtA is beneficial to language learners of elementary school levels, increasing learners’ intrinsic motivation to read and ability to comprehend (McKeown et. al. 1993, 2011; Keene & Zimmermann, 1977; Schiefele et. al. 2012; Baleghizadeh, 2011). However, few studies have been conducted on Taiwan’s junior high schools’ adolescent English learners. Although Liu and Chu (2008), Wu and Chu (2013) have conducted researches on QtA with such type of students and concluded that this approach is indeed beneficial to these students, studies on this topic are still not sufficient enough for us to generalize the conclusions to more English classrooms in Taiwan. Aside from the fact that QtA researches in Taiwan are too scant, another significant reason to do this current research is that the previous studies on QtA seldom probe the impact posed by QtA on readers’ motivation. Since English reading comprehension is considered important in Taiwan’s EFL environment, we may need to examine the effect of QtA in a different environment, both on reading comprehension and reading motivation.. Purpose of the Study and Research Questions The aim of this current study is thus to investigate the effect of Questioning the Author on reading comprehension and motivation of junior high school students in Taiwan. In this study, the QtA training will be implemented and its efficacy on three types of comprehension (factual, interpretive and responsive) will be assessed. In addition, how QtA affects students’ learning motivation in reading is also explored. The research questions are then proposed as follow: (1) Will QtA reading instruction make a difference on reading comprehension at three 5.

(17) level, factual, interpretive, and responsive, in junior high schools in Taiwan? (2) Will QtA reading instruction make a difference on reading motivations for junior high school students in Taiwan? (3) What are the students’ perceptions about QtA?. Definition of Terms Questioning the Author (QtA): Questioning the Author (QtA) is “an approach for text-based instruction that is designed to facilitate building understanding of text ideas” (Beck et al., 1997, p. 5). This approach helps students construct understanding of the text through the use of queries and discussion. The class is mainly student-centered.. Factual pausal units: A propositional analysis system is conducted based on pausal units or breath groups (Bernhardt, 1991). A pausal unit, according to Bernhardt’s definition, refers to a group of words “that has a pause on each end of it during normally paced oral reading (p. 208).” A text is divided into pausal units by two fluent speakers who read the text with a normal pace, and pause at the points that they think a pause is required. In this case, if the two readers have different pausal units, the more narrow units will be chosen (Bernhardt, 1991). In this study, in order to distinguish pausal units from other thought units, I name these pausal units “factual pausal units.” The factual pausal units that students write down on the recall sheet are therefore “recalled units.”. 6.

(18) Inferences: Inferences are propositions that readers create according to their interpretation about the text. Readers need to read “between the lines” (Alderson, 2000, p. 8) so as to make inferences from the texts.. Responsive thought units: Responsive thought units are propositions that readers write to give feedback to the text. When readers are required to do so, they need to connect what they perceive in the text, their experience and background knowledge. In this study, the students’ responsive thought units may possibly be further categorized into various types for later analysis.. Motivation: In this study, we'd like to adopt the definition for motivation presented in Ryan and Deci (2000, p.54-67) on intrinsic and extrinsic motivations, especially focusing on the former: intrinsic motivation, defined as the doing of an activity for its inherent satisfactions rather than for some separable consequence (Ryan & Deci, 2000). When a person is intrinsically motivated, he/ she is moved to act for fun or challenge entailed in the deeds rather than because of external prods, pressures or rewards.. Significance of the Study The study is significant in the following aspects. First, this study may shed light on a potential alternative for reading instruction in language classrooms. As Questioning the Author is a teaching strategy developed in the United States for L1 English readers, previous studies were predominantly conducted in the States and sporadically in Taiwan (Liu & Chu, 2008; Wu, 2013). Whether it is applicable in 7.

(19) Taiwan is yet to be consolidated. With the conclusion to be found in this study, we may be more confident in generalizing the effect to junior high school students in Taiwan. In addition, since the potential change of students’ motivation toward English reading is yet to be investigated, I would like to find the impact of QtA on students’ motivation to read. Last but not least, the relationship between comprehension and motivation within the scope of QtA is also one of the main issues in the current study. If QtA does pose positive impact on both reading comprehension as well as reading motivation, and is further confirmed the relationship between the two factors, it may be more persuasive for teachers in Taiwan to be more informed of the effects of QtA on students’ affective and cognitive responses so as to engage more students in their English reading classes.. Organization of the Study. In the first chapter of this study, a brief introduction about background and motivation is given, followed by research questions, definition of terms and significance of this study. The second chapter presents theoretical background and studies done by previous researchers. Chapter Three presents a design of the present study, including an illustration of a pilot study. The fourth chapter presents the results of the main study. The last chapter provides a discussion and implication.. 8.

(20) CHAPTER TWO LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter consists of four parts. In the first part, theoretical background concerning QtA will be introduced, in terms of models of reading comprehension and the role of motivation in reading comprehension. The second part presents the features and techniques on QtA, a teaching approach which is the focus in this study. The third part presents a comparison among previous studies on QtA effects will be presented in the third part. In the last part, potential impacts of QtA on EFL learners will be discussed.. Theoretical Background. The Current Comprehension Theories Since the present study probes the effect of QtA on reading comprehension, we may need to clarify what reading comprehension is. According to Kintsch (1978), a person is perceived to have understood a text when he or she is able to come up with the gist, to get the most obvious implication from the text, and to at least answer some questions about it. In addition to this view, there’re other definitions for the term “comprehension.” With the findings from the researches in psychology and brain studies, the definition has evolved from applying a range of cognitive skills in deciphering meaning of a text (Brown, El-Dinary, Pressley, & Coy-Ogan, 1995; Westera & Moore, 1995; Wu, 2013) to a more dynamic model. For example, Rosenblatt stated that readers’ interpretations of texts vary from person to person, for there are differences in individual knowledge involved in the process. Other 9.

(21) researchers, such as Wilkinson and Son (2011) and Malloy and Gambreall (2010), emphasize the contribution of socio-cultural context in the reading and the understanding. The definition given by Wilson and Son (2011) focuses on the dynamic and context-sensitive process of reading (p.359). Moreover, Malloy and Gambreall also proposed that interaction among readers also plays an important role in assisting readers’ cognitive growth (2010). In the following sections, two current reading comprehension theories accounting for individual knowledge and contextual factors will be introduced, helping us to define the term for this study.. Kintsch’s Construction-Integration Model.. One of the influential current. comprehension theories is the theory of Kintsch and Van Dijk (1978). This model describes the reading process from recognizing words to constructing a representation of the meaning of the text. Understanding the meaning of a text is the main focus in this theory. It goes from a “more bottom-up, loosely structured process” to construct a text (Kintsch, 1998, p.94) to an incorporation of the integration component into the construction-integration model (Kintsch, 1988). The construction-integration (CI) model states that when a reader reads a text, an "understanding" of the text is created in the reader's mind. Through the comprehension process the reader eventually constructs a “situation model” of the text situation. Kintsch and Dijk proposed that when a reader is reading a text, many propositions will pop out, making the reading process a chaotic situation. The propositional representation contains a list of propositions derived from the text. During reading process, these wild ideas go through a process of integration and become stabilized, and thus achieve well-structured coherence. In this process, the readers select the propositions that are coherent to the text and form a network of propositions. Such reading yields three different mental representations of the text, (1) 10.

(22) a verbatim representation of the text (the surface structure), (2) a semantic representation that describes the meaning of the text (the textbase), and (3) a situational representation of the situation to which the text refers (the situational model). The following is a further elaboration on the three levels. First, the verbatim representation of the text (the surface structure) is considered the most basic, which consists of the original words and phrases of the text. They are like the individual node in a network (Kintsch, 1998). The second level—the semantic representation that describes the meaning of the text (the textbase), is the textbase constructed by the semantic content in a framework of the text. The textbase itself is derived from the explicit content of the text. No extra information is involved. Since the comprehension network established by the textbase is still primitive, readers need to form links from their prior knowledge and personal experience, so that they may construct the relations among different propositions (Kintsch, 1988). The third level of representation is called situation model. In this level of understanding, readers are able to integrate the textbase and readers’ own prior knowledge as well as their experience. As a result, deeper level of understanding of the text is established (Kintsch, 1994, 1998). Kintsch’s CI model thus shed light on reading pedagogy, enlightening teachers to instruct readers on reading comprehension by facilitating and encouraging them to utilize their prior knowledge and experience when making sense of a text. That is to say, it is essential for readers to activate their prior knowledge while comprehending to make connection (Kintsch, 1994). In the CI model, the influence of mental process on comprehension is presented, though the relationship among the reader, the text and the author remains uncertain. Therefore, another theory proposed by Rosenblatt will be introduced to explain a successful reading that involves the transaction among the three elements during a 11.

(23) reading process.. Rosenblatt’s Transactional Model.. To present a clearer relationship among. the text, the writer and the reader, Rosenblatt presented “Transactional Model,” which suggests a "reciprocal, mutually defining relationship" (Rosenblatt, 1986) between the reader and the literary text. Rosenblatt argues that “the text is mere ink on paper until a reader joins in the reading process.” The “poem work,” which “refers to the artistic creation the reader builds when reading literary works,” (Rosenblatt, 1978, p.52) is what happens when the text is brought into the reader's mind and the words start functioning symbolically, evoking, in the transaction, images, emotions, and concepts, which can happen only in the reader's mind (Rosenblatt, 1978). Instead of taking place on the page or in the text, the construction of meaning lies in the act of reading. Without the act of reading, the text in the absence of a reader is nothing but imprinted words. No meaning should be built on the basis of the text alone. In this case, when meaning lies in the enactment by the reader rather than in the text, the discussion of literature demands consideration of the mind of the individual reader, requiring us "...to see the reading act as an event involving a particular individual and a particular text, happening at a particular time, under particular circumstances, in a particular social and cultural setting, and as part of the ongoing life of the individual and the group" (Rosenblatt, 1985, p. 100).. The emphasis on individual readers suggests that reading should not be submission to the text. Transactional theory proposes the essentiality of the reader's individuality. Readers should take the initiative to understand a work on the basis of prior experience. The prior experience, including the reader's background, the feelings, memories, and associations aroused by the reading, are not only relevant, but are the 12.

(24) foundation upon which understanding of a text is constructed. We may say that transactional theory invites the readers to reflect on what they bring to any reading, and to acknowledge and examine the responses the text evokes.. Transactional theory suggests that we pay attention to who the readers are, what they bring to the text, what they expect about it, and the choice-making process during the reading (Rosenblatt, 1985). In the choice making process, the choice of stance may be most crucial. In the theory, two reading stances are distinguished: the efferent stance and the aesthetic stance.. The efferent stance is taken by readers who try to seek information from the text. What these readers are mainly concerned about is what information they will carry away from the text. The aesthetic stance, on the other hand, is taken by the readers who do not seek particular information or the accomplishment of an assigned task, but rather the full aesthetic, emotional, and intellectual experience presented in the text. For these kind of readers, they adopt such a stance because they may not only read the printed content simply for information, but they would also like to appreciate feelings evoked in the text, the associations and memories aroused from prior experience, as well as the stream of images that come to mind during the reading process. In this present study, our focus is on aesthetic stance, in which the reader focuses primarily on the experience lived through during the reading.. Although it seems that various genres of literary works determine which stance the readers should take, they may actually take the initiative to decide whether to approach a text as a source of information “efferently” or as a source of poetic experience “aesthetically.” The readers need to select for attention to certain elements. 13.

(25) in the reading rather than others, and it is the teacher's task to make students think about different possibilities brought about by the two stances.. As discussed above, Rosenblatt puts the emphasis on the importance of readers. Since the reader plays a major role in the reading process, it may also imply that the authorization of the author is no longer assured, which also serves as an essential argument for this present study on the effect of Questioning the Author approach.. Theories about Motivation. Based on the foregoing discussion, I have introduced some of the current comprehension theories. Since this present study also touches upon the concept of motivation, I will discuss this notion, which is crucial to this study. In the following section, the definitions from different scholars will be introduced, and the relations among reading motivation, reading engagement as well as reading comprehension will be presented. Motivation Construct.. The term motivation is derived from the Latin verb. movere (to move). The idea of movement is reflected in such commonsense ideas about motivation as something that gets us going, keeps us working, and helps us complete tasks (Schunk, Pintrich, & Meece, 2008). Contemporary cognitive views postulate that individuals’ thoughts, beliefs, and emotions influence motivation. Schunk et al. (2008) defines motivation as “the process whereby goal-directed activity is instigated and sustained (p. 4),” which also focuses on learners’ thoughts and belief. Schunk et al. (2008) further elaborate the concept of motivation in terms of the following features: (1) motivation is a process rather than a product; (2) motivation 14.

(26) involves goals that provide impetus for and direction to action; (3) motivation requires activity—physical or mental; (4) finally, motivated activity is instigated and sustained (Schunk et al., 2010, p. 4-5). They reiterated that motivation can affect both new learning and the performance of previously learned skills, strategies, and behaviors. In the present study, we also believe that motivation can be aroused for the specific text during the process rather than a product, which is why we apply “during-reading” discussion, and eventually lead to boosting the product of general trait of motivation. These discussions provide motivation with mental exercises as well as impetus for our ultimate goal—to construct meaning for the reading text. Aside from that, since motivated activity can be instigated and sustained, students with high motivation to read may be more likely to become an interested and life-long readers in the future. With Questioning the Author, my goal is never confined to reading in the classroom; rather, it should be to encourage my students to become more motivated in terms of English reading, which in turn leads them to explore the joy of reading outside of the classroom.. The ultimate goal of reading motivation may echo the definition given by Guthrie and Wigfield (2000), who state that “Reading motivation is the individual’s personal goals, values, and beliefs with regard to the topics, processes, and outcomes of reading.” (2000, p.405) Reading motivation denotes the enduring readiness of a person to initiate reading activities and involves several dimensions (Schiefele et al., 2012; Wigfield & Guthrie, 1997). An important implication can be drawn from this definition: the individual is in control of his or her own motivation outside of the classroom, because it is determined by their beliefs, values, and goals (Guthrie & Wighfield, 2004).. 15.

(27) Guthrie and Wigfield (2004) hence elaborate this general, non-task reading motivation in the four discussions: (1) self-efficacy, (2) intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, (3) the valuing of reading, and (4) mastery goals. Among the four concepts, the former two can be more related to this present study than the others. Self-efficacy is defined as individual’s assessments of their ability at different activities and their sense that they can accomplish the activity. Studies have shown that a person’s self-efficacy mainly comes from successful previous performances. Hence, teachers may foster students’ self-efficacy by providing them with successful experiences (Bandura, 1997; Guthrie & Wighfield, 2004). As for the intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, according to motivation theories (Schunk, Pintrich, & Meece, 2008), extrinsically motivated reading is energized by its expected consequences (Wigfield & Guthrie, 1997). Therefore, extrinsic reading motivation refers to reasons for reading that are external to the activity of reading. It is a construct that exists when an activity is done because the doer is intended to attain some separable outcome. In contrast, intrinsic reading motivation is defined as the willingness to read because the activity itself is regarded as satisfying or rewarding. It is defined as the doing of an activity for its inherent satisfactions rather than for some separable consequences (Ryan & Deci, 2000). Studies have also indicated that since intrinsic motivation comes from readers themselves rather than from external sources, students become deeply involved in the activity they are doing and devote much time and energy to it (Ryan & Deci, 2000). In the present study, instead of offering students with additional rewards for reading, our goal is to ignite their intrinsic reading motivation by applying Questioning the Author method, which has been proved to pose positive impact on students’ perception on the reading process (Liu & Chu, 2008; Wu, 2013). In the following section, I would like to discuss reading motivation, reading engagement and reading comprehension, whose connection has been probed in 16.

(28) several previous studies.. Reading Motivation and Reading Engagement.. Reading engagement refers. to the mutual functioning of motivation, knowledge, strategies and social interactions during reading (Guthrie & Wigfield, 2004).. According to Guthrie and Wigfield's. study in 2004, there are several specific ways that motivation contributes to reading engagement by adolescents: (1) motivation influences adolescents' choices of which activities to do; (2) motivation activates adolescents' behavior; (3) adolescents' motivation influences how committed they are to the activities. Motivation, therefore, can be viewed as one of the key factors that drive junior high students to continue their reading process. Studies show that reading motivation is highly increased in accordance with the reading engagement involved in the process (Schiefelechaffner, Moller, & Wigfield, 2012). In this case, since higher level of intrinsic reading motivation can promote learners’ engagement, and higher level of learner engagement in turn leads to increased reading motivation, we may conclude that learner engagement entails reading motivation, and vice versa. Therefore, in our present study, we would also like to raise students’ intrinsic reading motivation by increasing their engagement during the reading process.. Reading Motivation and Reading Comprehension.. In previous studies,. researchers have found that reading motivation may be seen as a predictor for reading comprehension, indicating that with higher reading motivations, learners are more likely to achieve higher reading competence (Schiefele, Schaffner et al. 2012). In Taboada, Tonks, Wigfield, and Guthrie’s (2009) study, it was found that the desire to comprehend text stimulates a reader to activate background knowledge, and 17.

(29) implement relevant cognitive strategies. In addition, there are also studies showing that most of reading motivation and achievement are positively and significantly correlated (Chen, 2008). Studies also confirm that intrinsic reading motivation is moderately and positively related to measures of reading comprehension, whereas extrinsic reading motivation was found to be either negatively or not significantly associated with comprehension performance (Andreassen & Braten, 2010; Becker et al., 2010; Park, 2011; Taboada, Tonks, Wigfield, & Guthrie, 2009). However, scanty previous studies have confirmed the effect of QtA on raising readers’ motivation to read. Therefore, I would like to investigate the relation between the effect of QtA on motivation, especially intrinsic motivation, in reading to the effect of QtA on three measures of comprehension, which are factual, interpretive and responsive comprehension, respectively.. Questioning and Comprehension To facilitate reading comprehension through constructing meaning from texts, it is important that teachers offer explicit instruction in comprehension strategies. According to Pressley's observation, some components of comprehension strategies necessary to understand texts in general include: (1) activating prior knowledge, (2) questioning-generating, (3) images constructing, (4) summarizing, (5) identifying important information in texts (Pressley, 2000, p. 545). Among the above-mentioned components of comprehension strategies, questioning-generating has been widely discussed. Taboada and Guthrie (2006) postulated that questioning helps the reader to discover and process multiple conceptual levels of a text. Moreover, Per Urlaub (2011) also suggested that teaching language learners how to generate questions vis-à-vis texts improves their ability to critically read literary texts in the second language. 18.

(30) Questioning can be further categorized into the following four types: (a) teacher-questioning: question raised by teachers to help students construct meaning and understanding of the text, (b) student-generated questions, which is shown to be more effective than mere. answering teachers' questions (Pressley, 2000), (c). reciprocal questioning: an instructional procedure involving questions between teachers and students on main ideas and metacognitive strategies, so as to facilitate students’ critical thinking, and (d) questioning the author, with its main purpose for the implementation of being to allow students to explore the message the author is conveying in texts (James, 2006; Beck & McKeown, 1997). The last type, Questioning the author (hereafter QtA), will be applied in the present study, with its effect on reading comprehension and motivation being probed. Therefore, the next section will provide a more detailed introduction about this approach.. Questioning the Author. Assumptions of QtA Proposed by Beck and McKeown (Beck et al., 1996; Beck et. al., 1997), Questioning the Author, an instructional approach to reading, focuses on self-generating questioning, and stimulates readers to generate questions which they may ask the author in person if they were given a chance to interview him or her. (Beck et al., 1996; Beck et. al., 1997). It is defined by McKeown (1996) as an Instructional Approach to facilitate questioning, with the author’s authority being examined. Beck and McKeown developed QtA approach in the 1990s when they were trying to edit a text to cater to students’ needs. In the process of revision, they found that the authors of texts did not always make themselves understood, which resulted in incomprehensible texts for the readers. Doubting the authors’ writing ability might 19.

(31) not be a commonly encountered issue in the past, since authors of the books or writings were considered the authorities whose almighty power and knowledge shouldn’t be challenged. All the readers did is passively receiving information provided in the texts, taking everything the author said for granted. Even if the readers had doubt about what was being said, they might not question the authors’ ability to convey themselves; rather, they questioned their own reading ability. However, Beck and McKeown (1996) find that, as time goes by, readers have begun to understand that not being able to comprehend a text may not entail bad reading ability. Readers start to consider to blame the fallibility of the author to communicate ideas. This understanding tends to give readers courage to challenge the author for clarification, since the responsibility of comprehending the text has shifted from the readers to the author. In fact, the authors, although being full of expertise and specialized knowledge, may not be good writers in terms of expressing themselves or organizing the texts. Thus, researchers started to encourage readers to read with a “reviser’s eye.” They found that these students were more actively engaged with the texts, for they had become more confident with themselves when they knew they were not the only one to blame when the texts were not understood (Beck & McKeown, 2006). Hence, with self-generated questions to ask the author, the communication between the readers and the author unfold, as if the readers were granted an opportunity to interview the author. Although the interview does not happen in real situation, by raising questions and discussing with peers, the meaning is gradually constructed. In this case, the authors are only ordinary people trying to convey their own ideas through writing, sometimes with insufficient writing skills to make themselves understood. The researchers then further conclude that their effort of “grappling with ideas (Beck & McKeown, 2006 p.22)” by figuring out what the authors try to convey is the exact skill that should be introduced to the students. Students should be 20.

(32) equipped with the ability to challenge the author and read critically when they are reading texts. Readers may try to comprehend the writings by pondering on the answers to such questions as (McKeown et. al., 1993, p. 562), “What is the author trying to tell you?” “Why is the author telling you that?” ”Is that said clearly?”. QtA and Its Six Features Aside from self-generated questioning, there are six features of QtA that distinguish it from other reading instruction approaches: (1) during-reading discussions, (2) a focus on context, (3) the promotion of active search for meaning, (4) the primary importance of discussions, (5) the notion of authors’ fallibility, and (6) the segmentations of the text. The first feature of QtA is the during-reading discussion. When it comes to discussion instructions, L1 teaching methods such as the Reflective Thinking Project (Anderson et al., 1992), the Conversational Discussion Groups Projects (O’Flahavan & Stein, 1992), the Book Club Project (McMahon, Raphael, Goately, Boyd & Pardo, 1992), and other L1 and L2 reading instruction approaches (e.g. those of Langer, 1986, 1990 and Nystrand, 1997) also examined social processes, discussion, in the classrooms and the context (Langer, 1986; Nystrand,1997; Applebee, Langer, Nystrand, & Gamoran, 2003). However, QtA comes with a major difference from them, which lies in the “discussion timing.” While in the above-cited approaches, discussion usually takes place after the reading process, QtA has the discussion during the reading process. This helps the readers to see how the comprehension is built (Beck & McKeown, 2006). A second feature of QtA is a focus on content, rather than on strategies. A plethora of Reading Instruction approaches have focused on the teaching, modeling, and practicing of strategies that mature readers use as they read, such as predicting, 21.

(33) inferring and summarizing. These approaches include Reciprocal Teaching (Palincsar & Brown, 1984), Informed Strategies for Learning (Paris, Cross & Lipson, 1984), Direct Explanation (Duffy et al., 1987), etc. Despite that these teaching approaches put more focus on the ongoing reading process, as does QtA, they attend to the use of strategies, and the necessity of such emphasis is being questioned (Dole, Duffy, Roehler, & Pearson, 1991; Pearson & Fielding, 1991). QtA differs from these approaches in that it focuses on the meaning of the texts, which should have been the central purpose of reading. A third feature of QtA is the promotion of active search for meaning. In QtA approach, the traditional teacher-centered type of class instruction is reversed to student-centered classroom. In traditional classrooms, teachers are considered to be the leaders, and take the initiative to lecture as well as raise questions. Teachers tend to be the one who knows everything about the texts. In contrast to this type of instruction, QtA proposes the concept in which teachers and students collaborate with each other to achieve “building understanding” (Beck & McKeown, 1997, p.17). Students are directed to explain the information from the texts to themselves, because studies have shown that students are better at learning the materials when they find out the information and explanations by themselves (Chi, Bassok, Lewis, Reimann, & Glaser, 1989). Hence, under QtA approach, students take up more roles in comprehending the texts, not totally relying on teachers’ explanations. In this case, students take the active roles to construct meanings instead of receiving messages from the teachers without any doubts or thinking. Therefore, students’ engagement in reading process is also increased. Fourth, discussions are primarily important in QtA. Discussion itself is not the goal, though; rather, it is the means toward the goal—constructing meaning. Since the goal should be achieved through the collaboration of students and teachers as well, the 22.

(34) latter are actively involved in the discussion as facilitators, guides, initiators and responders. Through discussions, the whole class, including the teacher, constructs meaning of a text during a QtA lesson. As for the fifth feature, the concept of “fallibility of the author” (Beck & McKeown, 2006, p.30) is the core idea that encourages students to release themselves from all the responsibilities of the reading process. The authors should also share some part. Based on this notion, when students have difficulties understanding texts, they are encouraged to challenge the author instead of taking all the blame on themselves. As a result, they will become more confident readers and take a more active stance in understanding the texts. This may be more challenging for Chinese students, who tend to be comparatively obedient and believe in the notion of proverbs such as: “In textbooks you will find houses made of gold;” “Reading takes you anywhere.” Although an old Chinese saying goes, “Believing in everything in books is worse than having no books,” Chinese students may sometimes be too humble to question what is being said in books. In addition to the characteristics mentioned above, one more feature of QtA – the text is introduced segment by segment – is also significant, since in QtA, students are educated that readers need to “take on” a text little by little and try to understand while they are reading. Each segment, which is not necessarily one paragraph, contains an issue or idea that the teachers want the students to pay attention to. The issue can be about an important message that the author is trying to convey, or some points that may become obstacles in the reading process. Aside from that, students also need to make connections and relations among ideas that appear in various parts of the text so that they my construct meaning for the whole text. Because of the segmentation, the whole class can launch a discussion on one important issue one at a time to figure out the author’s intention, so as to build understanding step by step. 23.

(35) In sum, QtA is unique in that it puts more emphasis on the teacher-student collaboration with during-reading explanatory responses. In addition, it is the only approach that pays attention to the fallibility of the authors (Beck & McKeown, 2006).. Techniques of QtA There are two techniques used in Questioning the Author, queries and discussion moves. Queries are frequently applied to draw students’ attention to certain points in the text in which the author may try to convey specific information, and to engage students in asking, or even, to challenge the authors on their skill of expressing themselves in written texts. There are two types of queries, “initiating queries” and “follow-up queries.” Another technique is “discussion moves,” which consist of six moves. Queries are used to enrich discussion content; discussion moves are used to promote discussion in process.. Queries.. In QtA’s during reading process, teachers frequently pose questions,. which are termed "queries," for students to answer or discuss. They are different from the questions asked in common instructional practice, which represent levels of comprehension from simple to complex. QtA centralizes only higher-level questions. As in the commonly adopted, Barrett's taxonomy (Alderson & Urquhart, 1984) which categorized questions into: (1) literal comprehension, (2) reorganization, (3) inferential comprehension, (4) evaluation, (5) appreciation, and in Day (2005)'s: (1) literal, (2) reorganization, (3) inference, (4) predictions, (5) evaluation, (6) personal response. These types can range from the lowest to the highest level. High level types of questions are considered open-ended and have no fixed answers, allowing students to connect their own ideas or life experience to the text. 24. In QtA, these higher-level,.

(36) open-ended questions are frequently utilized, presented in forms of “queries.” Queries aim to assist students in dealing with text ideas as they read (Beck & McKeown, 2006). Query differs from questioning in three aspects: (1) while questions assess students’ reading comprehension after reading, queries are more process-oriented, assisting students with developing the meaning of the text in the course of reading; (2) while questions focus on teacher-to-student interactions, queries facilitate group discussion, boosting student-to-student interactions; (3) while questions are used before or after reading, queries are used during initial reading. Thus, queries turn teachers from a Q & A host to a discussion facilitator, with students taking more active roles in the process of constructing the meanings of a text. In addition, traditional questions usually expect certain fixed answers. When the answers are given, the discussion ends. However, queries seem to be an opening of a discussion, following which more and more discussion topics may possibly be generated. In conclusion, we may find where the three major differences of questions and queries lie: (1) traditional questions restrict thinking, while queries invite students to explore ideas by themselves; (2) teachers assess students’ reading comprehension by evaluating their answers to questions teachers propose, while queries guide students’ to build up meanings without being judged by their answers, since there is usually no restricted answers.. Studies (Beck & McKeown, 2006) also show the different effects. questions and queries bring to reading lessons in practice: (1) in question-driven lessons, students’ responses are usually brief and in authors’ language, while in query-driven lessons, students tend to provide longer, more elaborate answers using students’ own language; (2) discussion dynamics also differ. In question-driven lessons, there is little student engagement, with the questions all initiated by teachers. In contrast, in query-driven lessons, there is high student engagement, with more 25.

(37) student-initiated questions (Beck & McKeown, 2006).. Thus, if we feel like creating. a more student-centered learning environment, utilizing queries may be a good choice.. Two Types of Queries.. Researchers have also divided queries into two types:. initiating queries and follow-up queries (Beck & McKeown, 2006). Initiating queries are usually used to open the discussion. Teachers have to be sensitive enough to find out the points that may bring confusion to the readers and should be able to initiate questions for them to ponder about. Initiating queries can be posed as follow: ◎ What is the author trying to say here? ◎ What do you think the author wants us to know now? ◎ What is the author talking about? ◎ What’s the important message in this section? In the initiating queries, the teachers’ responsibility is to make public the points that should be paid attention to. They are not the ones to provide answers, though. It’s the students that are expected to explore the answers themselves. As for follow-up queries, they aim to guide students along productive lines of thought. When the students are doing the thinking, follow-up queries assist students in integrating and connecting ideas to build meanings. Some examples of follow-up queries are as follow: ◎ What does the author mean here? ◎ Does that make sense with what the author told us before? ◎ Does the author tell us why? ◎ Why do you think the author tell us that now? We can see that follow-up queries help students re-examine and refer to the previous parts of the text, assisting them to make connections of the information 26.

(38) provided (Beck & McKeown, 2006).. Discussion Moves.. In QtA lessons, queries are frequently used by the teacher. to initiate discussions, so discussion can be the major activity and come in varied functions, which is defined as "moves." Studies also suggest that inviting students to communicate their understanding of text ideas as they construct it supports their comprehension (Kukan & Beck, 2003). Several discussion moves are designated to specify how a discussion is conducted (Beck & McKeown, 2006). The followings are different moves made during a discussion: First, Marking. This involves teachers’ drawing students’ attention to a certain point or idea, emphasizing its importance and using it to unfold further discussion. Second, Turning-back. This can refer to turning back to the text while the discussion is going wild beyond the text itself, or turning back to students who should be responsible for doing the thinking. Third, Revoicing. This means that when students have difficulty expressing their ideas, teachers may give them a hand, and try to rephrase what the students intend to say. Fourth, Recapping. This happens when teachers try to highlight or review what the students have already developed so far. During this phase, students have usually achieved a certain understanding from the text, or built a point that is essential for the comprehension of the text. Fifth, Modeling. In the process of modeling, teachers try to make public to students some of the process they undergo during reading. Teachers may use the think-aloud strategy to show their students how they think and reason when they are reading a text. Sixth, Annotation. Similar to modeling, annotation also involves more teachers’ 27.

(39) efforts. This happens when teachers need to provide information to fill in gaps during a discussion. They annotate by adding information to the discussion that is important if students are constructing a deeper understanding of a text. In order to keep an orderly process, making good use of six discussion moves was essential as well. A sample lesson with types of Queries and Discussion moves will be presented in Chapter Three.. Previous Studies on QtA In previous studies, QtA has been proved to have increased learners’ reading in a higher level of comprehension (Margaret, McKeown et. al. 1993, 2011; Liu & Chu, 2008; Wu, 2013), in which learners are more able to interpret the texts and also raise higher level questions. The most notable study conducted on the topic of QtA was done by Margaret, McKeown, Sandora and Kukan in 1996. The researchers recruited two teachers (one of whom was a social studies teacher, and the other was a reading and language arts teacher) and their 23 fourth graders for one semester. The results of this study suggest that in the QtA lesson, according to lesson analysis, more student-generated questions were involved, indicating that student-centered atmosphere prevailed in the QtA class. Besides, during the semester, question types also shifted from information-retrieving questions to more meaning-constructing questions, and more extended discussions were involved. The two teachers’ teaching journals also showed teachers’ realization that increased student engagement in class is more important than mere class maintenance, that their lower-achieving students participated more in the class discussion than they used to, and that they were delighted to make a change in their teaching style. The 28.

(40) students’ interview also reflected their positive attitude toward QtA lessons, stating that the concept of the author’s fallibility gave them confidence to continue reading when encountering difficulty, and that they were encouraged to read between the lines to get a deeper understanding about the texts. Moreover, students found their ability to organize the clues in the texts has improved. In addition to the qualitative data discussed above, the quantitative analysis of pretest and posttest revealed improvement on students’ reading comprehension and monitor ability. These two kinds of abilities were both probed through students’ oral responses to certain questions. While reading comprehension questions were about the content of the text, monitoring questions were questions about their critical thinking, such as “Is there anything here that the author didn’t say clearly?” The pretest-posttest comparison of recorded oral response to initial queries showed that students’ comprehension levels have risen after QtA lessons. In addition, reader’s ability to monitor their comprehension (p. 391) was greatly increased as well. Besides Beck, Margaret and Sandora’s studies (1996), which mainly focus on L1 learners, a few studies aiming at L2 learners in Taiwan also confirm the positive impact by QtA. For example, Liu and Chu (2008) have conducted an experimental study on QtA with 62 ninth graders in Taiwan in a QtA group and a control group. Students were instructed with QtA approach, reading five Aesop’s fables of about 600 words. The pretest and posttest on recall of two Indian fables were used and on three levels of comprehension: factual, inferential and responsive, in duration of five weeks to probe the transfer effect of QtA on reading comprehension. According to the results of the study, QtA approach does not make a difference in recall. However, analysis of inferences made in recall data show that QtA did not assist students to generate text-based inferences, yet aided them to effectuate more reader-based inferences. As for incorrect inferences, the application of QtA did not make a difference. Analysis of 29.

(41) Comprehension questions indicate that QtA did not impact on the response to factual questions and responsive questions, but on interpretive questions. In addition to recall and reading comprehension, the student’s perception on receiving QtA lessons also showed that QtA yield positive attitudes in terms of enhancement in reading comprehension, vocabulary growth, their thinking ability and grammar knowledge. Besides Liu and Chu’s research done in 2008, another study conducted by Wu in 2013 probed EFL senior high school students’ potential level of comprehension change with the intervention of QtA approach, as well as students’ types of response to written texts. In the study, 94 senior high school students were recruited, participating in the four-week intervention of QtA lessons. The researcher chose six North American short stories as treatment materials, each containing about 1070 words. Besides, two modern fables written by James Thunber were selected to serve as pretest and posttest materials. This study also probed QtA’s effects on comprehension, dividing question types into factual, interpretive and responsive questions. However, the result did not cohere with that of Liu’s and Chu’s study, suggesting that QtA assists students in answering responsive questions but not factual or interpretive questions. In addition, the research revealed that QtA lessons do not assist students’ writing ability in terms of numbers of words or thought units. Concerning writing quality, QtA was found to generally enhance the ability to increase intellectual responses and decrease textual and incorrect responses. In addition, the result of the perception questionnaire showed that students favored the activity of figuring out the author’s message through whole-class discussion. As for students’ perception of growth in reading ability, most of the students in the experimental group believed that their reading and thinking ability was boosted by QtA approach. Likewise, most of them also claimed that QtA lessons improved their general English ability. 30.

(42) Both of the last two researches mentioned above suggest a positive attitude toward QtA approach. Students are eager for more QtA lessons, and are even willing to try to apply the approach to their future reading process (Wu, 2013).. Potential Impacts of QtA on the Comprehension and. Motivation of EFL Students. According to the findings stated in previous studies, it is assumed that Questioning the Author can help EFL learners in Taiwan to construct meaning of the text by incorporating personal thinking or background knowledge. Equipped with the ability to read critically, students in Taiwan may be expected to develop avid lifelong readers with independent thinking ability. QtA can be an effective instructional approach to facilitating EFL high school students’ higher-order thinking reading comprehension, and to boosting students’ reading motivation as well, since previous studies also probed students’ perception about being instructed with QtA approach and confirmed the positive effect on students’ willingness to read more English texts. By now, the previous studies have put their focuses on reading comprehension, applying pretest and posttest to see whether the intervention of QtA made any difference to students’ comprehension ability. While Beck at el. (1996) categorized reading comprehension into three levels, Liu and Chu (2008) and Wu (2013) differentiated questions into factual, interpretive and responsive types. Although some conclusions have been drawn according to these studies, there are still some gaps left to fill in concerning QtA research. For instance, in the latter two studies conducted in Taiwan, though the question types were identically categorized, there is a mismatch between the results on reading comprehension growth, with one arguing that QtA 31.