Choose Any 3–4 Questions
Central Idea & Understanding
1. What is the author's main message or central idea?
Summarize it in 2–4 sentences and identify one piece of evidence that supports your conclusion.
Evidence & Reasoning
2. What is the strongest piece of evidence presented in the article?
Explain why it is convincing and how it supports the author's point.
Author's Purpose
3. Why do you think the author wrote this article?
Is the author trying to inform, persuade, analyze, explain, challenge a belief, inspire action, or accomplish something else?
Use evidence from the text.
Inference
4. What conclusion can you reasonably draw that the author never directly states?
Support your inference with details from the article.
Perspective & Bias
5. What assumptions does the author seem to make about the topic or audience?
Do these assumptions strengthen or weaken the article?
Explain.
Connections
6. How does this article connect to another topic, event, book, class, or experience?
Be specific and explain the connection.
Relevance
7. Why does this topic matter today?
Who is affected by the issue or idea discussed in the article, and why should people care?
Questions & Curiosity
8. What is one question the article left unanswered?
Why would answering that question help you better understand the topic?
Evaluation
9. What part of the article was most convincing, surprising, confusing, or thought-provoking?
Explain your reaction and reference specific details from the text.
Looking Forward
10. What might happen in the future if the trends, ideas, discoveries, or issues discussed in the article continue?
Make a prediction and explain your reasoning using evidence from the article.
Vocabulary in Context
11. Choose one unfamiliar, interesting, or important word from the article.
Without using a dictionary, explain what you think the word means based on the surrounding sentences.
Then explain:
- What clues helped you determine the meaning?
- Which words or phrases in the article were most useful?
- How confident are you in your interpretation?
(Optional: Look up the word afterward and compare your prediction to the dictionary definition.)
Interpreting Direct Meaning
12. Select one sentence, statistic, claim, quotation, or piece of evidence from the article that you think is especially important.
First, explain what the author is saying in your own words.
Then explain:
- Why this detail matters
- How it contributes to the author's overall message
- What a reader might misunderstand if they read it too quickly