Tackling the Misconceptions of Text-Dependent Questions

and responses to determine its effectiveness in improving reading comprehension, listening, and speaking. More specifically focusing on the question, “Does intentional, scaffolded questioning and scaffolded responses improve reading comprehension?” This study will analyze reading comprehension and Common Core standards, more specifically, Anchor Standard 1. Additionally, the study will be conducted so that educators will better understand if students have gathered key understandings from the text through the intentional process of asking and answering scaffolded questions.

http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/CCRA/R/

Understanding scaffolding and the ZPD in educational research (Verenikina, n.d) discusses in scaffolding in great detail. As teacher accountability grows as a focal point of education, intervention is at the crux of effective instruction. Scaffolding is one of many strategies that has gained popularity throughout the years as one such intervention.  Verenikina (n.d.) posits that the definition and interpretation of the term “scaffolding” varies from study to study. The term scaffolding can be surmised as the co-construction of knowledge and skill between the teacher and the learner (Verenikina, n.d.) .

Puntambekar, S.  (2009), also gives a great explanation of the term scaffolding in the article, Scaffolding. The article gives examples of scaffolding, scaffolding in classroom situations, peer interactions, and distributed scaffolding. It is noted that the term was first introduced in 1976 by Wood, Bruner, and Ross. The most interesting component of this article was the section on Peer interactions. In this situation, a peer is the expert instead of the adult. The concept of reciprocal teaching in the jigsaw strategy is mentioned in this section of the article.  The first two pieces of literature lay a great foundational framework for understanding what scaffolding is and how to implement the process in the classroom setting.