To correctly answer a question a child must first determine what kind of question was asked. For some questions, they must also understand the underlying inference that the question is making. Many children can answer the direct WH questions such as "Who teaches a class?" but cannot answer, "How will he know what kind of robot to build?" To assist the child in developing the inference skills necessary to answer the question we provide a picture, Main Idea (MI button), and Topic Sentence (TS button).
Listen to the Main Idea (usually just a word) and the Topic Sentence. Discuss how they relate to the picture. This gets the child focused on the details of the picture so that they can more accurately answer the question. Then listen to the Question (Q button). We have provided an answer to the question, but our answer is just one of many possible answers. Other answers that the child gives can still be scored as correct. Disagreeing with the answer is also encouraged to demonstrate that different people see the same question and may answer it differently.
The purpose of the exercise is to pay attention to what kind of question is being asked, think about the situation, then answer the question.
The record and playback feature allows the child to record their answer and see if it makes sense to them when they hear it played back. Can they determine if they answered the right kind of question? Was their answer correct?
This Intermediate Level app uses the content from the Word Practice game from LocuTour’s Artic Games & More CD and requires moderate level inference skill.