The Effect of Question-Answer Relationship (Qar) Strategy On First Grade High School Efl Students' Reading Comprehension

International Journal of Language Learning and Applied Linguistics World
(IJLLALW)
Volume 7 (2), October 2014; 300-‐312 Hosseini Faard, M., & Rimani Nikou, F
EISSN: 2289-‐2737 & ISSN: 2289-‐3245 www.ijllalw.org
THE EFFECT OF QUESTION-ANSWER RELATIONSHIP
(QAR) STRATEGY ON FIRST GRADE HIGH SCHOOL EFL
STUDENTS’ READING COMPREHENSION
Mehrnaz Hosseini Fard
Department of English, Urmia Branch, Islamic Azad University, Urmia, Iran
Farahnaz Rimani Nikou (corresponding author)

Department of English, Urmia Branch, Islamic Azad University, Urmia, Iran
ABSTRACT
Question-Answer Relationships (QAR) is a reading comprehension strategy developed to “clarify
how students approach the tasks of reading texts and answering questions” (Raphael, 1986, p.
176). This study was carried out in order to identify the efficiency and the effects of Question-
Answer-Relationship strategy (QAR) on the reading comprehension ability of EFL students in
first grade high school of Mohaddeseh, Urmia, Iran. The participants were 56 female students
who were assigned to one control group and one experimental group. All the participants
answered the reading comprehension questions as a pre-test. The QAR strategy was conducted in
experimental group, with no treatment for the control group. After the treatments, students
answered the questions of an equivalent post-test. The data was analyzed using SPSS software to
determine the effect of strategy as an independent variable on studentsʼ reading comprehension
as a dependent variable. The results suggested that there was a statistically significant difference
among the reading comprehension of the experimental group and the control group in their post-
test scores. The results of this study cater for several incentives for the researchers in the fields of
applied linguistics, psychologists, language teaching methodology, English for Specific or
Academic Purpose (ESP/EAP), and many other language-related areas of interest who are
interested in improving reading comprehension ability of EFL students.
KEYWORDS: Reading, Reading comprehension, QAR strategy
INTRODUCTION
The interest in English language is increasing by developing communication and information
technologies. Upon a boom in the interest in English language, those working in the field mostly
focus on how to teach English more effectively or how students can learn this language on their
own. In order to study a language either as a first or second language, one makes an effort to
develop and integrate four basic skills which are listening, speaking, reading and writing.
However, it is difficult to improve all these skills all at once in terms of teaching a foreign
language, since proficiency in learning a foreign language differs from one learner to another,
whereas a native language can be learnt by all the members of a society to some extent.
Therefore, it is necessary to implement various methods and strategies in order to help learners
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improve their second or foreign language learning in different aspects. According to
Richards and Rodgers (2002), teaching is usually regarded as something that teachers do in their
classes in order to make some changes in their learners. A central component of methodology is
how teachers view their roles in the process. The teacher’s role is to activate the students in the
process of learning.
Reading for the purpose of learning has come to be one the most important topics in the field of
Test of English as a Second Language (TESL) or Test of English as a Foreign Language (TEFL).
Some generations back Grammar–Translation method was the most common reading method, but
it had lots of short comes. Reading became more important when the main aim of language
instruction was to enable students to learn academic subject content through reading textbooks
and similar materials (Nunan, 1993).
Getting the main idea and understanding what is being read is one of the most important ends of
reading in all fields. Widdowson (1979, p.136) has discussed reading as "the process of
combining textual information with the information a reader brings to a text. According to Hayati
(2006) reading involves comprehension and when readers do not comprehend, they are not
reading. It is generally agreed that well-developed reading comprehension ability is the key point
of students’ academic success. This comprehension ability is not a passive state, but it is an active
mental process needing to be nurtured correctly (Gardill & Jitendra, 1999).
Based on some studies, EFL students’ inability to understand the texts is made of some inside
and outside factors. The inside factors include students’ learning motivation, age, aptitude, and
learning style. Meanwhile, the outside factor is related to the teacher’s techniques which are used
to create good classroom atmosphere. The teachers should be able to recognize the students’
problems and to create encouraging atmosphere in the classroom that will increase the students’
competency to understand reading comprehension. Consequently, English teachers are expected
to apply the appropriate technique which will surely work to accomplish learners’ need of
reading comprehension (Nyoman & Nyoman, 2013).
As a matter of fact, teaching reading in schools seemed to fail to provide students with reading
skills that they actually need. To be able to achieve the skills, teaching reading should be
inventive. In this way, reading experts consent that a systematic and research-based instructional
model that directly and explicitly teaches students the skills and strategies to comprehend texts is
necessary if students are to comprehend what they read (Almanza, 1997; Richeck, 1987). There
are many different strategies that have been implemented by different researchers with the aim of
improving reading comprehension skills of EFL learners in various contexts. Question
answering strategy is a pattern of these methods, which help learners to participate in learning
processes effectively. Therefore, this study intended to take an action in the process of while-
reading implementing Question-Answer Relationship (QAR) strategy, in order to examine the
effect of this strategy on EFL students’ reading comprehension skill.
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LITERATURE REVIEW
Reading according to Longman Dictionary of Language and Applied Linguistics, is "perceiving a
written text in order to understand its content" (Richards & Schmidt, 2002, p.180).This can be
done silently. The understanding that results is called reading comprehension. In defining reading
comprehension as the process of simultaneous extraction and construction of meaning from a
piece of written language, Snow (2002) asserts that any cognitive, motivational, linguistic
preferences, and the knowledge base called for in the act of reading is based on the text and
specific activities in which a learner is engaged.
According to Davies (as cited in Nunan, 1991) in reaction to traditional reading exercises, that are
extremely limited in their potential as learning activities, good reading tasks have some features
such as:
• typically makes use of authentic and challenging texts;
• Provide students with a rhetorical or topical framework for processing and analyzing the
text;
• Frequently involve an oral reading of the text by the teacher or a student followed by
silent reading and rereading of the text;
• Involves the students interacting with the text and with each other;
• Involve students in direct analysis of the text instead of indirect question answering;
• Frequently involve the transfer of information from text to a visual or diagrammatic
representation.
He also believes that active reading tasks incorporate these features:
• Students make their hypotheses explicit;
• Hypotheses are evaluated by other students and checked against the text;
• There is discussion about alternative interpretations;
• Students ask questions about what they do not know instead of answering questions to
which they know the answers or which may be seen as irrelevant;
• If necessary, the teacher can adopt a role of informant rather than inquisitor;
• Students learn to be critical in their reading of a text (p.262).
August et al. (as cited in Chastain, 1998) report that students often need help in learning to
monitor their own comprehension. In other words, they keep on reading without being aware that
they are not comprehending, and they need to learn when they lose track of the strand of the
author’s ideas. Good readers use lots of strategies before, during and after reading (Dogan, 2002).
Also, teachers can creates activities that enhance students’ motivation and increase their level of
comprehension. Leow (as cited in Chastain, 1998) proposes practical advice for teaching reading
skills. He urges language teachers to encourage the students to guess, to tolerate ambiguity, to
link ideas, to paraphrase, and to summarize so that they stop dwelling on isolated words often not
critical to comprehension.
Question-Answer relationship (QAR) is a strategy to be used after students have read. It also,
teaches them how to decode what types of questions they are being asked and where to find the
answers to them (Raphael & Au, 2005). QAR is a reading comprehension strategy developed to
"clarify how students approach the tasks of reading texts and answering questions. It also,
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encourages them to be active, strategic readers of texts" (Raphael, 1986, p. 176). Questioning has
long been used by teachers as a way to guide and monitor students’ learning. "Research shows
that teacher questioning strongly supports and advances students' learning from reading"
(Armbruster, Lehr, & Osborn, 2001). "No comprehension activity has a longer or more pervasive
tradition than asking students questions about their reading, whether this occurs before, during, or
after reading" (Duke & Pearson, 2002).
Raphael (1986) spent time observing students and the strategies students use while answering
questions. She found that many students fell into one of two categories: 1) Those who relied only
on their memory or prior knowledge to find answers or 2) those who relied only on the text.
These observations revealed the importance of teaching students the relationships between
questions and answers. As a result, Raphael (1986) developed an approach called QAR or
Question-Answer-Relationships which teaches students how to distinguish questions with
answers that are found "in the book" and questions with answers found "in my head." Raphael's
(1986) research with QAR has confirmed that when students are taught to use the strategy, their
ability to answer questions correctly improves. Raphael also found that through QAR, students
developed a language for talking about the strategies they use to answer questions.
Conner (2006) highlights Question-Answer Relationship (QAR) as a reading strategy in which

students categorize comprehension question according to where they get information they need to
answer each question. The students are asked to identify whether the information they use to
answer the questions about the text is textually explicit or implicit information. Therefore, QAR
assist students in differentiating among questions based on where the answer can be found: either
In the Book or In My Head (Caldwell & Leslie, 2005).
Table 1: Summary of Taxonomies around the Types of Questions (Raphael, 1986)

In the Book In My Head
Right There Author and You
The answer is easily found in the The answer is not in the text.
text. The exact words for the The reader combines previous
questions and answers are located knowledge with text information
in the same sentence. to create a response.
Think and Search On My Own

The answer is in the text, but The answer is not in the text.
requires gathering information from The reader uses previous
different places in the selection. experience to respond.
Raphael (1986) discloses the rationales of implementing QAR in teaching reading

comprehension; 1) It helps students learn the kind of thinking that different types of questions
require, as well as where to go for answers in the text. It encourages students to be more
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proficient and strategic readers; 2) It helps students to ask effective questions as they read and
respond to the text; 3) Teachers use QAR to guide and check student learning and to advance
higher-level thinking in their students.
Besides, Conner (2006) adds his logical reasons for the strength points of the possibility in
implementing the QAR in teaching reading in EFL teaching, that is, it helps the students figure
out how to go about answering the questions based on a given text and it helps students
understand the different types of question and requires the students to analyze the types of
question. Zygouris-Coe and Glass (2004) affirms that QAR technique helps students better
understand the text learned. It helps students to think about the passage they are reading and
beyond it, too. It motivates them to think creatively and work cooperatively while challenging
them to use higher-level thinking skills.
In the literature a considerable body of research exists regarding the effects of using different
strategies on improving EFL learnersʼ reading comprehension. Question-Answer Relationship
has been one of them implemented in EFL classrooms with diverse populations as a means of
promoting EFL learnersʼ reading comprehension. Some studies in this regard are as follows:
Song (1998) studied the effect of strategy training on reading in an ongoing university foreign
language reading classroom. The training method was modified from the procedure developed by
Brown and Palincsar (1984), which involved four concrete reading strategies: summarizing,
questioning, clarifying, and predicting. Results showed that strategy training was effective in
enhancing EFL reading, and that the effectiveness of the training varied with L2 reading
proficiency. The results also indicated that students' performance on certain types of reading
comprehension questions improved by the training method. These findings suggest that foreign
language reading pedagogy, especially for adult students in academic settings, should include
explicit and direct strategy teaching.
Salataci and Akyel (2002) investigated the possible effects of strategy instruction of Turkish EFL
students on Turkish and English reading as L1 and L2. The results indicated that strategy
instruction had a positive effect on both Turkish and English reading and reading comprehension.
Gooden, Carreker, Thornhill and Joshi (2007) investigated the effect of instruction of meta-
cognitive strategies instruction on reading comprehension and vocabulary achievement of third-
grade Students. It was found that the meta-cognitive reading comprehension instruction
significantly improved the academic achievement of third-grade students in the domains of
reading comprehension and vocabulary over the other instructions that was offered to the
students in the comparison school. The intensity of the study and the systematic instruction of
meta-cognitive strategies led to positive effects on understanding written text, which is the main
reason for reading.
Peng, Hoon, Khoo, and Joseph (2007) studied the impact of Question-Answer-Relationships
(QAR) on Reading Comprehension. The study was carried out based on Raphael’s (1984)
recommendations to introduce and practice the use of the QAR strategy. Findings showed that
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students taught through the QAR strategy had some improvements in their reading
comprehension test scores after intervention compared to the control group. The qualitative data
analysis showed that more than half of the pupils taught through the QAR strategy felt more
confident about answering comprehension questions after learning the strategy.
Kinniburgh and Prew (2010) investigated the effect of teaching Question-Answer Relationships
(QAR) to students in a kindergarten, first, and second grades for the purpose of laying a strong
foundation for reading comprehension. The results indicated that the QAR strategy, if
implemented effectively, could increase the comprehension of young students and provided a
strong foundation for reading comprehension.
Sudiana, and Adi Jaya Putra (2013) had an experimental study on the comparative effect between
QAR and directed reading thinking activity (DRTA) techniques on reading comprehension on the
tenth year students. The research’s result indicated that (1) there was a significant difference in
reading achievement between students who are taught by using QAR technique and those taught
by using DRTA technique in descriptive and narrative text type; (2) there was a significant
difference in students’ reading achievement between the students who were taught by QAR
technique and those taught by DRTA technique. Moreover, the difference of the mean score
indicated that QAR technique was more effective than DRTA technique.
Hemmati, and Bemani (2013) studied the effects of 'Question-Answer Relationship (QAR)
strategy', 'summarizing', and 'syntactic structure identification training' on the reading
comprehension of Iranian EFL learners. The results suggested that there was statistically
significant difference between the reading comprehension abilities of the three classes.
Furthermore, the use of QAR strategy led to better comprehension of reading texts with syntactic
structure training and summarizing that there was no significant difference between them.
Considering the previous researches, it can be seen that instructing and implementing different
strategies are useful and have significant roles on improving EFL studentsʼ reading
comprehension at different levels and stages. Consequently, this research intended to use QAR in
while reading process on a population with different levels that was not conducted previously, in
order to investigate the strategy influence on EFL studentsʼ reading comprehension in first grade
high school.
RESEARCH QUESTION
This study was supposed to answer the below question:
Does Question-Answer Relationship significantly affect EFL students’ reading comprehension?
METHODOLOGY
Participants
To conduct this research, two groups of first grade high school students of Moaddeseh high
school in Urmia were selected. Each group consisted of 28 female students who were mostly 16
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years old and also with similar economic and social conditions. One group was treated as control
group and the other was treated as experimental group. While English was as a foreign language
for all the participants, they had different mother tongues, mostly they speak in Turkish and some
in Kurdish or Farsi.
Table 2: The number of research participants

Total number of Experimental Control
participants group group
Pre-test 56 28 28
Post-test 56 28 28
Instruments
Two passages were selected from the first grade high school standard work book, Gaj
International Publications written by English language experts in Iran, as pre- and post-test
measures. Passages were selected based on the length, interest, level of proficiency, and number
of questions. Both passages were approximately one paragraph in length, had a parallel construct
and were selected from the same source, as mentioned above. Both experimental and control
groups received the same passage for pre-test and the other passage for post-test measures. Both
pre-test and post-test took place in a classroom setting during regular class times.
No changes or modifications were made to the texts, but as a result of consulting with some
experts in the fields of language instruction, measurement and evaluation (Teachers and
supervisors), there were some changes in the number and the type of questions. Some questions
were also reworded. After that, the experts confirmed the convenience and correctness of the
tests, they were copied and administered for the study. Each passage contained ten questions
including five multiple choice questions and five true-false questions and the same scoring
method, in which students were asked to select only one answer from four options, for multiple
choice questions and only one answer from two options for true-false questions. Each question
had one point; therefore, the total score of each test was ten points. Prior to the study, the
researcher conducted a pilot exam on another group (out of the sample) of first grade high school
students in the same school, who were 28 students, to calculate reliability of the questions in pre-
test and post-test exams. Considering the α = 0.834 (more than 0.7), based on the Cronbach's
Alpha formula, it concluded that the tests were reliable.
Procedure
Prior to treatments, a pretest was conducted on two groups to assess their reading comprehension
ability. Then students in two groups participated in a posttest to re-assess their reading
comprehension abilities, and to investigate any significant differences in their reading
comprehension. After doing a warm up activity for ten minutes to introduce QAR strategy in the
experimental group, it was conducted on the following procedure:
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The passage copies were distributed among the students and before starting to read the passage
they were asked to fold their papers in a way that they could not see the questions below the
passage (it was constantly controlled through the activity by the teacher). Then, they were asked
to read the passage silently and underline the words they did not know, and then ask the meaning
of difficult words loudly from each other one by one, each student asked one of her unknown
words that was not asked before by the other students, if nobody knew the answer the teacher
gave the meaning. Afterward, the students were asked to read the text for the second time and
pose different questions from the text, then ask their questions loudly from each other one by one,
and answers with their own answers from the text, each student asked one of her questions that
was not asked by the other students before and if nobody knew the answer the teacher discussed
it with the students until to reach the correct answer. The process of question-answering from the
passage continued in this way until the teacher asked the students to open their papers and answer
the questions below the passage on their papers and also on their own. At the end, the papers
were collected to be used for analyzing the data.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The Homogeneity Of Variances requires the research groups to have similar variances or similar
reactions to the treatment they received. If this assumption holds, we know that whatever test
result (t-test or F test) we find, is attributable to the different treatment each group receive
(treatment effects). Furthermore, Leven test is testing whether or not the variances of the groups
are statistically different, if the Leven test shows the significant value more than 0.05, we can
have confidence in the validity and homogeneity of our sample.
Table 3: ANOVA: Determining Homogeneity of the Sample

Source of variation Sum of squares df Mean squares F statistic sig
strategy 21.455 3 7.152
1.864 0.140
error 414.464 108 3.838
total 435.920 111 --------
As we see in Table above, as a result of Analysis of Variance, degree of significance is 0.140,

which is more than 0.05, indicating that the groups of study were homogeneous; in other words,
they were in similar conditions for conducting research treatment. In Table below, we will see a
summary of descriptive statistics of pre-tests in both groups of the study, in order to make sure
that no significant difference in terms of reading comprehension ability existed between the two
groups.
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Table 4: Descriptive Statistics, Comparing the Performance of the two Groups on the Reading Comprehension Pre-
test
Group N Variance Mean Range SD Min Max
Control 28 pre-test 6.1071 8 1.77094 2 10
QAR 28 pre-test 5.7857 9 2.42452 2 10
As we see in Table above there was no significant difference in terms of reading comprehension
ability existed between control group and the experimental group. In this part, we are going to
have data analysis for the null hypothesis of the study, comparing pre-test and post-test scores of
the experimental group using QAR.
Ho: Question-Answer Relationship has no effect on EFL students’ reading comprehension.
Table 5: Paired Sample t-test Comparing the Pre-test and Post-test Scores for QAR Strategy
strategy pre-test post-test Mean SD T value df sig Lower Upper
Mean Mean difference bound bound
QAR 5.7857 7.25 1.4625 0.44686 3.277 27 0.003 0. 54739 2. 38118
Table 5 shows that the mean of post scores are higher in dependent variable compared with the
pre-test scores in experimental group. The degree of significance is also 0.003, which is less than
0.05. Moreover, the mean difference, upper bound and lower bound columns show positive
signals. Therefore, the descriptive results of experimental group using QAR strategy, indicated
that there is a significant difference between pre- and post-test scores of the group. In other
words, this group performed better after using QAR strategy, and it reveals that using QAR
strategy had positive effects on students’ reading comprehension performance. Hereby, the null
hypothesis can be rejected. Table below shows Analysis of variance (ANOVA) which was
conducted to determine the significance of differences in reading comprehension among EFL
students due to QAR strategy in experimental group compared with the conventional strategy in
control group.
Table 6: Means of Post-test Scores Across Groups for QAR Strategy

Mean of Mean of Mean Standard sig Lower Upper
exp. group control group difference error bound bound
7.25 5.5
1.7500 0.38459 0.000 0.7464 2.7536
The result showed that there is a significant difference between the mean scores of the
experimental group using QAR strategy and the control group’ mean score in post-test.
Moreover, the value of significance is 0.000, which is less than significant level ( 0.05), also
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positive signals of mean difference, lower bound and upper bound reveal that students using
QAR strategy tend to get higher scores on reading comprehension than the students in control
group. Therefore, we are safe to reject the null hypothesis.
Discussion
This study attempted to seek the answer to the following research question:
Does Question-Answer Relationship significantly affect EFL students’ reading comprehension?
The data analysis showed that, QAR strategy had positive effect on students reading
comprehension. The findings of the study are in parallel with Raphael and Au (2005) who reveal
the reasons of implementing QAR in teaching reading comprehension: 1) It encourages students
to be more proficient and strategic readers; 2) It can help students to ask effective questions as
they read and reply to the text; 3) Teachers use QAR to guide and check studentsʼ learning and to
support higher-level thinking in their students.
Readence (2006) pointed out that the National Reading Panel (2000) has endorsed QAR as an
effective means of improving comprehension. Questioning has also long been used by teachers as
a way to guide and monitor studentsʼ learning. "Research shows that teacher questioning strongly
supports and advances students' learning from reading" (Armbruster, Lehr, & Osborn, 2001, p.
224-231). "No comprehension activity has a longer or more pervasive tradition than asking
students questions about their reading, whether this occurs before, during, or after reading" (Duke
& Pearson, 2002, p. 147-168). Zygouris-Coe and Glass (2004) affirm that QAR technique helps
students better understand the text learned. It helps students to think about the text they are
reading and beyond it, too. It motivates them to think creatively and work cooperatively while
challenging them to use higher-level thinking skills. Therefore, the result for the first research
question in the present study strongly affirmed what the above-mentioned scholars claimed.
Therefore, the findings of this research paved the way for the acceptance of the believes that:
Students often need assistance in learning to monitor their own comprehension, August et al. (as
cited in Chastain, 1998). Reading was characterized as an active process of comprehending and
students required to be taught strategies to read more efficiently (Grabe, 1991). Reading
comprehension strategies are as means or plans for assisting and extending comprehension
(Hardebeck, 2006). Moreover, research shows that teacher questioning strongly supports and
progresses students' learning from reading (Armbruster, Lehr, & Osborn, 2001). No
comprehension activity has a longer or more invasive tradition than asking students questions
about their reading, whether this occurs before, during, or after reading (Duke & Pearson, 2002).
CONCLUSION
This study attempted to seek the effect of Question-Answer Relationship strategy on EFL
students’ reading comprehension. Based on the findings of the study, it was concluded that using
QAR strategy in the experimental group improved the students’ reading comprehension, and the
statistical analysis revealed that there was a significant difference between the experimental
groupsʼ performance and the control group performance in post-test while their pre-tests’
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performance were approximately the same. These findings are in accordance with many
researches done by many scholars such as: Raphael and Au, (2005); Readence, (2006); Duke and
Pearson, (2002); who mostly believe that QAR strongly supports and develops studentsʼ reading
comprehension.
Implications of the findings

Discovering and identifying the EFL learnersʼ performance in Iranian context, which is totally
different from other foreign situations, could be an opportunity for EFL programmers to deeply
explore into the learners’ area of potency and preference in better obtaining the language.
Moreover, the results of this study supply some motivations for the researchers in the fields of
applied linguistics, psychologists, language teaching methodology, English for Specific or
Academic Purpose (ESP/EAP), and many other language-related areas of interest, who are
interested in improving reading comprehension ability of EFL students.
This study was subject to the following limitation:
In this study, the researcher had an access to a limited number of female EFL students in first
grade high school in a particular context within a short period of time, so the findings might not
be generalized to other contexts to a larger degree.
The result of this study can be incentive for:
Other researchers to do some longitudinal strategy based research working in different contexts
and on a large number of participants; pilot similar strategies on other groups of students with
different levels of proficiency and on learners with different first languages, or studying other
target languages.
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The Effect of Question-Answer Relationship (Qar) Strategy On First Grade High School Efl Students' Reading Comprehension

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The Effect of Question-Answer Relationship (Qar) Strategy On First Grade High School Efl Students' Reading Comprehension

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International Journal of Language Learning and Applied Linguistics World

Farahnaz Rimani Nikou (corresponding author)

KEYWORDS: Reading, Reading comprehension, QAR strategy

Conner (2006) highlights Question-Answer Relationship (QAR) as a reading strategy in which

Table 1: Summary of Taxonomies around the Types of Questions (Raphael, 1986)

Think and Search On My Own

Raphael (1986) discloses the rationales of implementing QAR in teaching reading

Table 2: The number of research participants

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Table 3: ANOVA: Determining Homogeneity of the Sample

total 435.920 111 --------

As we see in Table above, as a result of Analysis of Variance, degree of significance is 0.140,

Control 28 pre-test 6.1071 8 1.77094 2 10

QAR 28 pre-test 5.7857 9 2.42452 2 10

Ho: Question-Answer Relationship has no effect on EFL students’ reading comprehension.

QAR 5.7857 7.25 1.4625 0.44686 3.277 27 0.003 0. 54739 2. 38118

Table 6: Means of Post-test Scores Across Groups for QAR Strategy

Implications of the findings

This study was subject to the following limitation:

The result of this study can be incentive for:

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