Resources 1: Asking questions – to encourage pupils to think critically about a story

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

Example A: A story about a family

You could ask questions such as:

  • Which family members are included in this story?
  • Which of them seem to be the most important? How can you tell?
  • Is your family similar to this? If so, in what ways? If not, how is it different?
  • What do the family members do in this story? Would people in your family behave like this?
  • What do you think the writer wants readers to believe about families?

Example B: A story set in a school

You could ask questions such as:

  • Is the school in the story like our school?
  • In what ways is the building similar? In what ways is it different?
  • In what ways are the people – head teacher, teachers, pupils – similar to those in our school? In what ways are they different?
  • Do the people in the story behave or act like people in our school or do they behave or act differently? Give examples to support your answer.
  • What do you think the writer wants readers to believe about the school in the story?

Note: You could ask questions like these about a village, town or city in which a story takes place. The idea is to get pupils to make comparisons between what they know and what they are reading about.

3. Using adverts to encourage critical thinking

Resource 2: Outline of a letter to an author