About Interpretive Questions
An interpretive question has more than one answer that can be supported with evidence from the text.
"Ah! you don't know what these beans are," said the man. "If you plant them overnight, by morning they grow right up to the sky."
"Really?" says Jack. "You don't say so."
Does Jack believe that the beans will grow right up to the sky?
Parts of the story will support the idea that Jack does believe the man's words, but other parts suggest that he does not. "Really, you don't say so" might be sarcastic and condescending, or it might be naive.
Simply knowing what the text says is not enough. If we want to understand Jack and this story, we need to figure out what the text means by these words.
To answer an interpretive question, the reader must figure out what the text means by what it says.
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