Promoting self-questioning through picture book illustrations

Abstract

This teaching tip manuscript demonstrates how picture book illustrations can be used as an inquiry tool that facilitates one's connecting of visual investigations in a picture to the process of generating self-questions. Techniques suggested to promote self-questioning are (1) introducing young readers to an interactive picture book read aloud with prompts, such as, What do you notice? and What questions do you have? instead of teacher-driven prompts that result in student statements, (2) using selected perplexing picture book illustrations as a medium for fostering and modeling the self-questioning process, (3) partnering readers together so that they investigate picture book illustrations, determine questions, and search for answers collaboratively, and (4) encouraging independent reading of self-selected picture books to apply self-questioning techniques.