Dialogic Reading

Dialogic reading

Dialogic reading is a way to help children become actively involved in what is being read. It has been described as conversation between children and adults about a book. Children love picture books and often want to go through the same one many times. Using the techniques of dialogic reading can greatly enhance children's learning, especially language and vocabulary. It also gives some structure to teachers, which helps make reading and discussion time focused and productive.

This technique involves questions and then expanding on the original thinking. There should also be a lot of modeling and confirming what the child is thinking. After the child is confident in answering "What" questions, the teacher can begin adding open ended questions. The conversations should be just that, conversations, not grillings.

Use the following steps for the dialogic reading technique:

"What" questions ("What do you see?" wait Answer) If the child does not give an answer, the teacher should model an answer, and then have the child repeat the answer.
Confirmation ("Yes, it is a train.")
Expansions ( "Yes, it is a train. It is a passenger train." wait "What kind of train is it?")
Open ended questions ("What is it used for?" wait Answer. "Where are they going?" wait Answer)
Other open ended questions ("How did that happen?", " What else?", "What if __?", "Why?")
Model. Model. Model!
Have fun!

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