A method of teaching in which a teacher and four students form a collaborative…

Concept: Reciprocal Teaching is a dialogic, small-group reading-comprehension technique: a teacher and a small group of students take turns leading discussion of a text passage using four cognitive strategies — predicting, questioning, clarifying, and summarising. By modelling and gradually transferring these strategies to students, the teacher works within the learners' Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD, Vygotsky), so that comprehension monitoring becomes an internalised, self-directed skill.

Application: The stem describes exactly this structure: a teacher plus four students form a collaborative group with distinct roles, they hold dialogue about the content of a text passage, and this scaffolded interaction creates a zone of proximal development in which reading comprehension improves — the defining signature of reciprocal teaching.

Cross-check: Each distractor names a different, well-known technique; checking their defining features against the stem's clues shows none of them describes a role-based comprehension dialogue:

• Grammar Translation Method centres on translating the passage into the learners' native language and memorising explicit grammar rules drawn from it, worked through individually rather than in defined group roles.

• The Structural Approach centres on presenting learners with graded sentence patterns and structures to drill and practise, working on sentence form rather than through student-led dialogue roles.

• Model Reading centres on the teacher reading the passage aloud as a demonstration of fluent, expressive reading for students to listen to and imitate, rather than through a multi-role student dialogue.

Result: The technique described — a teacher and four students in defined roles holding text-based dialogue that builds reading comprehension through the zone of proximal development — is Reciprocal Teaching.