The best way to develop students' metacognitive skills is for teachers to do which of the following?

The best way to develop students' metacognitive skills is for teachers to do which of the following?

• A. Give students a few global prereading questions to guide their reading
• B. Advocate and model the use of self-questioning strategies during reading
• C. Have students memorize the new vocabulary words needed to comprehend the reading selection
• D. Provide opportunities for students to write comprehension questions for one another

Answer: (B)

Developing students' metacognitive skills comes from showing them how to regulate their own thinking while reading. When a teacher models self-questioning—thinking aloud about what is being read, what it means, and what to do next—students see concrete steps for planning, monitoring, and adjusting their understanding as they read. This ongoing demonstration helps students adopt these strategies themselves, making their comprehension more deliberate and self-directed. Over time, they can apply those self-questioning habits to new texts without prompting. Other approaches touch on aspects of reading, but they don’t embed the active, ongoing use of metacognitive strategies. Providing a few prereading questions offers initial guidance but not the sustained practice of monitoring meaning during reading. Memorizing vocabulary builds word knowledge, not the ability to think about and regulate understanding. Having students write comprehension questions for peers promotes engagement with the text, yet without the teacher’s explicit modeling of how to use those questions to guide thinking, the metacognitive process isn’t consistently demonstrated.

Developing students' metacognitive skills comes from showing them how to regulate their own thinking while reading. When a teacher models self-questioning—thinking aloud about what is being read, what it means, and what to do next—students see concrete steps for planning, monitoring, and adjusting their understanding as they read. This ongoing demonstration helps students adopt these strategies themselves, making their comprehension more deliberate and self-directed. Over time, they can apply those self-questioning habits to new texts without prompting.

Other approaches touch on aspects of reading, but they don’t embed the active, ongoing use of metacognitive strategies. Providing a few prereading questions offers initial guidance but not the sustained practice of monitoring meaning during reading. Memorizing vocabulary builds word knowledge, not the ability to think about and regulate understanding. Having students write comprehension questions for peers promotes engagement with the text, yet without the teacher’s explicit modeling of how to use those questions to guide thinking, the metacognitive process isn’t consistently demonstrated.