Reciprocal Teaching

Kyle Summers

What is Reciprocal Teaching?

Reciprocal teaching refers to an instructional activity in which students
become the teacher in small group reading sessions. Teachers model, then
help students learn to guide group discussions using four strategies:
summarizing, question generating, clarifying, and predicting. Once students
have learned the strategies, they take turns assuming the role of teacher in
leading a dialogue about what has been read. Reciprocal teaching stimulates
the students desire to learn by teaching others and setting a purpose for
reading. This strategy can be used in all educational settings and all reading
levels. It can also be used with any type of text presented by the teacher.

Formative assessment

During class time

Why use Reciprocal Teaching?

It encourages students to think about their own thought process during

reading.

It helps students learn to be actively involved and monitor their

comprehension as they read.

It teaches students to ask questions during reading and helps make

the text more comprehensible

How to use Reciprocal Teaching:

Before Reciprocal Teaching can be used successfully by your students, they
need to have been taught and had time to practice the four strategies that
are used in reciprocal teaching (summarizing, questioning, predicting,
clarifying).
One way to get students prepared to use reciprocal teaching: (from Donna
Dyer of the North West Regional Education Service Agency in North Carolina)
1. Put students in groups of four.
2. Distribute one note card to each member of the group identifying each
person's unique role:
o

Summarizer

Questioner

Clarifier

Predictor

3. Have students read a few paragraphs of the assigned text selection.

Encourage them to use note-taking strategies such as selective

underlining or sticky-notes to help them better prepare for their role in

the discussion.
4. At the given stopping point, the Summarizer will highlight the key ideas
up to this point in the reading.
5. The Questioner will then pose questions about the selection:
o

Unclear parts

Puzzling information

Connections to other concepts already learned

6. The Clarifier will address confusing parts and attempt to answer the
questions that were just posed.
7. The Predictor can offer predictions about what the author will tell the
group next or, if it's a literary selection, the predictor might suggest
what the next events in the story will be.
8. The roles in the group then switch one person to the right, and the next
selection is read. Students repeat the process using their new roles.
This continues until the entire selection is read. (Source: ReadingQuest)
9. Throughout the process, the teacher's role is to guide and nurture the
students' ability to use the four strategies successfully within the small
group. The teacher's role is lessened as students develop skill.

1st Reading:
Iraqi forces take large parts of Tikrit from ISIS, prime minister says
Iraqi troops aided by Shiite and Sunni forces reached the center of Tikrit
Tuesday in an offensive against the Islamic State for control of the city, the
countrys prime minister announced.
Our security forces have reached the center of Tikrit and they have
liberated the southern and western sides and they are moving toward the
control of the whole city, Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi said in a statement
released by his office, according to Reuters.
Abadi said U.S. and Iraqi-led airstrikes have helped reclaim ground.
But Abdul-Wahab al-Saadi, the commander of the operation, said his forces
fighting in from the west were still 325 yards from the center of Tikrit.
A defense official told Fox News that hundreds of ISIS fighters are holed up in
the center of Tikrit and have booby-trapped their positions, making it difficult
to retake the center of the city.
[ISIS] has had a long time to build fortifications, plant bombs and make it
very difficult on the advancing forces, the official added.

2nd Reading
An Associated Press reporter embedded with Iraqi security forces saw
soldiers surround the iconic presidential palace in Tikrit on Tuesday, as well
as surround the provincial government headquarters there.
Street-to-street fighting raged into Tuesday afternoon and estimates on how
much of this strategic city on the banks of the Tigris River that Iraqi forces
held widely differed. Iraqi army Lt. Gen. Talib Shaghati said at least 75
percent of the city had been recaptured. Ammar Hikmat, deputy governor of
Salahuddin province, said more than 40 percent of Tikrit was under Iraqi
control.
"Our security forces are now pushing forward toward the presidential
complex and have already entered parts of it," Hikmat said. "I think the
whole city will be retaken within the coming 24 hours."

The large-scale operation to recapture Saddam Hussein's hometown began

on March 2 and is seen as a key step toward eventually recapturing Mosul,
the country's second largest city, which lies further north.
Iraqi military commanders said Monday they retook a hospital in southern
Tikrit. The officials, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of
anonymity because they were not authorized to brief journalists, said the
military's three-pronged offensive is progressing toward the center of Tikrit
slowly because of booby traps and suicide bomb attacks.
At least four suicide bombers tried to ambush one of their positions in
southern Tikrit on Monday, but the attack was repelled.
The ground offensive to retake Tikrit has been waged by Iraqi troops and
Shiite militias advised by Gen. Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard's elite Quds Force.
The leader of Iraq's Popular Mobilization Units, a collaborative force made up
mostly of Shiite militias, also said Tuesday his fighters had rejoined the Tikrit
operation, less than a week after announcing a boycott over U.S.
involvement.
Abu Mahdi al-Mohandis told The Associated Press that his fighters
participated in the southern offensive Tuesday and would be joining the
offensive on the northern and western fronts shortly.
Fox News' Lucas Tomlinson and The Associated Press contributed to this
report.