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As I share new evidence-based tools for increasing calm, focus and achievement in school, I also look for any research on more traditional approaches. Recently, I focused on the traditional practice of sitting in rows. Here is what I turned up:

1. "Seating Arrangements That Promote Positive Academic and Behavioral Outcomes: A Review of Empirical Research," by Rachel Wannarka & Kathy Ruhl. Support For Learning, 2008 "There is no single classroom seating arrangement that promotes positive behavioral and academic outcomes for all tasks, because the available research clearly indicates that the nature (i.e., interactive versus independent) of the task should dictate the arrangement. Teachers, especially those who have students with special educational needs that impact on their behavior in inclusive or homogeneous settings, should be able to eliminate many disruptions that are due to inappropriate student interactions by utilizing a rows arrangement for individual tasks and moving desks together when interaction is desirable."

2. Education Week, June 23, 2014 "Smart Seating Charts: the Key to Better Performance?" "Research has found that classroom seating arrangements have a great impact on student performance and behavior. A study done by Angela Hammang at Montana State University found that when carefully crafted seating charts were in effect, teachers were twice as successful reaching students and that the attainment of lower ability students was doubled. In her research, Hammang experimented by moving students around in different seating charts to help them find their optimal place; in this case it was a biology classroom, based on learning styles and personalities. She also looked at groupings by gender and past grade performances. In all cases, the students performed at a higher level when the teacher assigned seating in a calculated manner. Students on the underachieving end of the spectrum showed the most improvement when classroom seating was developed with thought, and not simply assigned based on the alphabet or another random manner. Duncan Wilson has 16 years' experience as a teacher who was looking for a way to streamline classroom practices to make the most of the time he spent with his students. Along with a software engineer Gintautas Sasnauskas, he formed Edukey Education Ltd in 2011 and created software that guides educators through the process of assigning classroom seating based on reasonable conclusions about the students. ClassCharts is available to all teachers for free and allows for collaboration between classrooms and among teachers. Since the software became available in 2013, more than 70,000 teachers have signed up..."

3. The Illinois education department information site provides research-based information on myriad topics including seating arrangements. "There is no such thing as one right way to seat students, just as there is no single way to teach all students. Seating must be differentiated to match the activity of the lesson...In a classroom, when we want students to be on task on an individual assignment, we should give each student their own 'island of time'. The easiest way to do this is to increase the space between students." Along with increasing space, aligning students to face in one direction (for individual tasks) will improve on-task time. Students who face the board learn more... Anything but group seating is better for individual work." For some tasks "...on-task behavior rose by 15% overall when students were placed in rows. " Mixed-sex seating produces the highest pupil on-task levels. Similarly, disruptive behavior in both classes was at its lowest when boys and girls sat together. What also emerged clearly from the results was that children with the lowest on-task study levels were most positively affected by the change from mixed to same-sex seating."

4. Last, some teachers with whom I work say: (Taking into account differences based on age and need of student, available resources, supervisor expectations, and the task at hand).

Have a variety of seating arrangements available and move from one to the other as the content and task suggests. Include time on the rug-floor, or at round tables, individual desks and individual computer desks.

Have one desk for each student in rows, all facing the board, but create a relaxed tone with soft lamps, a couch in a corner, exercise balls to sit on if desired, and many opportunities to move around or come to the board during a lesson.

Have round tables in the middle of the room for individual, dyad or group work and individual desks rimming the classroom where students keep their work and go for quiet reflective time. More mature students can work on independent projects at round tables if there is a little space between students, giving them the opportunity to ask for peer help when needed and the companion of a peer nearby.

Hopefully, this gives you some new ways to think about running a smoother class and meeting individual needs by enhancing seating arrangements. I also hope that one of the main 'seats' you will use this summer is a beach chair!

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As I share new evidence-based tools for increasing calm, focus and achievement in school, I also look for any research on more traditional approaches. Recently, I focused on the traditional practice of sitting in rows. Here is what I turned up: "Seating Arrangements That Promote Positive Academic and Behavioral Outcomes: A Review of Empirical Research," by Rachel Wannarka & Kathy Ruhl.

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Classroom seating High school Ideas (not lab based) 

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Classroom seating High school Ideas (not lab based) 

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Interested in switching to flexible seating? Get funding ideas, helpful tips, and how-to photos from the pros-your fellow high school teachers.

Courtesy of Josh McDaniel

Teacher Stephanie Sleeper was intrigued by a photo of a flexible high school classroom, but she needed to know more. "Can I ask how many students you have in an average class?" she asked Emily Polak, who took the picture. "I so want to do this with my high school social studies classroom, but I'm worried about space."

Sleeper wasn't the only one feeling anxious. The sheer size of high school students is a concern for teachers who are exploring the leap to flexible seating in grades nine through twelve. Without the efficiency of rows of desks, how do you squeeze a lot of big kids into learning spaces that are often no larger than 700 square feet?

And the questions didn't stop there when we asked high school educators for their thoughts on flexible seating. They also wanted to know if flexible seating would make things too casual, producing a climate of distraction-or even outright chaos. A few educators worried that there might be more students sleeping in class, or using the new space to socialize with friends instead of learning. Other teachers, already spending too much of their own money on classroom upgrades, expressed doubt about finding the money to fund purchases of new furniture.

The good news? In our recent email interviews with 20 teachers who have converted to flexible seating-five of whom were high school teachers-we found positive responses to most of the common issues. High school teachers were making flexible seating work in rooms that averaged about 750 square feet. The number of students per class ranged from 27 to 34. Respondents were almost universal in reporting that their students took their seating options seriously and that discipline problems had actually decreased since the shift to flexible seating.

There were some challenges. Furniture breaks more easily with bigger bodies, a few teachers noted. Funding often came up short of ambitions, leaving teachers to source tables, couches, and chairs from friends and family, thrift stores and garage sales, PTA grants, and crowdfunding campaigns on sites like DonorsChoose. Standardized testing forced some of the teachers to bring desks back into the room at intervals.

But none of the teachers expressed regret. Almost all of our interview subjects-across all 20 classrooms, from kindergarten through high school-loved their new setups. Some of them had started small and then evolved their classrooms gradually. A few had come to flexible seating after many years in traditional spaces. "I am in my 13th year of teaching, but this is my first year to incorporate flexible seating into my classroom," said first-grade teacher Ashley Rice Broomfield, before expressing a common sentiment: "I will never go back to traditional seating."

Here's a look into the classrooms of four high school teachers who we reached out to.

Emily Polak

Classes: English 9 and Freshman Composition
School: Bob Jones High School, Madison, Alabama
Students/Room Dimensions: 27-31 students; room is 780 square feet, about 30 feet by 26 feet

Setting It Up: My goal for this project was to make students feel at home in my classroom. I had a very small budget, so I relied heavily on donations and bargain hunting at thrift stores. The PTSA at our school provided me with a grant of $200, which allowed me to purchase a couch, a love seat, a rug, two small tables, and about eight folding chairs. A friend donated a coffee table, while a parent donated a second area rug. I added my own soft lighting, additional bookshelves, and Harry Potter decorations to make the room feel additionally cozy. Some of my students actually prefer to sit in desks, which surprised me, while others tuck themselves away in the Harry Potter reading nook.

Benefits: Discipline issues have significantly decreased. My students seem to feel more relaxed and more motivated in a setting that honors their choices. I have not had to assign seats for the majority of the semester because my students know that if they cannot get their work done on the "fun seats," they will be moved to a desk. I make sure to explain to them that this isn't a punishment; I am here to help them be successful, and sometimes that means making hard choices.

Josh McDaniel

Class: 11th-Grade English
School: Ronald Reagan High School, San Antonio, Texas
Students/Room Dimensions: 30 students; room is 780 square feet, about 30 feet by 26 feet

Setting It Up: I used hanging lights, Christmas lights, and Edison lights to give the room an atmosphere of relaxation. I added a recliner, love seat, and sofa-and even a disco ball to the ceiling and black lights around the Smart Board for special days and assignments. I installed a charging station for phones and brought in a mini-fridge and microwave. Students have a stake in the comfort because they donate coffee and tea for the Keurig. Each grouping of desks has its own supply tub for the week: scissors, glue sticks, note cards, and sticky paper. There's even an official class pet called Bruce the Beta Fish. I let the students see my personality a bit through the inclusion of family pictures and a wall of college and sports memorabilia.

Benefits: The students have responded with better attendance and written work, improved grades, and a more positive culture in the room. If students are worried about their phones, their stomachs, or being tired, they can't pay attention and focus in class. Now I have removed those issues from the equation.

Kendra Caralis

Classes: 9th-Grade World History
School: Grosse Pointe South High School, Grosse Pointe, Michigan
Students/Room Dimensions: 30-32 students; room is 750 square feet, about 30 feet by 25 feet

Setting It Up: A major hurdle was making sure the school could still use my room for state testing, so twice a year the students help me move the desks back into the room. We pile all the furniture up in the front of the room to make space. I funded some furniture purchases through a DonorsChoose campaign, and I did a fair amount of garage sale shopping over the summer. Some was old furniture I owned, and a few pieces were donated from families in the classroom. I don't implement a seating chart. During the first week, I make students choose a new seat each day so they get a chance to try out different spots-and they are aware that I reserve the right to move them at any point.

Benefits: Most of the examples I've seen were for little kids with little bodies, so it wasn't easy to make the adjustments for high schoolers. Students tell me they can focus better in my room because they aren't uncomfortable, and I have not had any issues of kids falling asleep. I think there are probably fewer kids falling asleep this year than in previous years, when I just had desks.

Nichole Murray

Classes: Spanish 3 and 4
School: Marina High School, Huntington Beach, California
Students/Room Dimensions: 25-37 students; room is 784 square feet, about 28 feet by 28 feet

Setting It Up: I changed seating formats during the year. For the first four months of the 2016-17 school year, my 153 Spanish 3 and Spanish 4 students had a traditional seating classroom. They all sat in student desks facing forward or moved the desks into group configurations. After that the same students had a flexible seating classroom with a layout that included a wide variety of furniture types. We have four standing desks, two cocktail tables with stools, two armchairs with ottomans, a sofa, four gaming chairs, and two beanbag chairs. For the first two weeks of the new seating, students had to try a different seat every day to experience each of the 10 "zones." After that students could choose where they wanted to sit on a first-come, first-served basis.

Benefits: I conducted a survey (there were 143 participants) to test the results of the new flexible seating model. Here's the basic summary: Students transitioned to the new seating style easily, strongly favored the change, and made their daily seating selection with a desire for success in mind. Students were less sure that they were "retaining information better" than that they "were not distracted," but the overall results were very encouraging.

This article would not have been possible without the contributions and/or photography of the following educators: Kendra Caralis, Josh McDaniel, Nichole Murray, Emily Polak, and Mylène St-Cyr. Their classrooms are amazing, and we're grateful they shared them with us.

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Interested in switching to flexible seating? Get funding ideas, helpful tips, and how-to photos from the pros-your fellow high school teachers.

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Students in Steven English’s 8th grade science class build their understanding of variables in an experiment by engaging in small group and whole class discussions. The teacher facilitates student-centered discussion through questioning and the use of a koosh ball technique.

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Talking to a Partner (Interactive Modeling)

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start at 2:08

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Julia St. Martin's 10th grade ELA class uses a fishbowl protocol to practice citing evidence from informational text to support their reasoning. This video was produced by Expeditionary Learning at Springfield Renaissance School.

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Accountable Talk is Making Thinking Visible 

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Accountable Talk is Making Thinking Visible 

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All grades

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Sentence Stems for Science: Providing Scaffolds

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Sentence Stems for Science: Providing Scaffolds

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Uppergrade accountable talk anchor chart 

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Uppergrade accountable talk anchor chart 

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Anchor Charts to Show Thinking and Act as a Reference 

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Anchor Charts to Show Thinking and Act as a Reference 

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What is it? Why do I need this in my classroom? 

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What is it? Why do I need this in my classroom? 

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Basics of Accountable Talk

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One of the goals the writers of The Common Core Standards had in mind was to build natural collaboration and discussion strategies within students, helping to prepare them for higher levels of education and collaboration in the workforce. In our Common Core classrooms today, students are being asked to incorporate multiple strategies, complex texts, and evidence-based responses. When faced with this overwhelming task, we must put many building blocks in place for our kiddos to be successful.

Buddy Talk - a best practice - benefits everyone in the classroom. Of course we know buddy talking is important, but in the Common Core classroom, Buddy talking is IMPERATIVE. Peer explanations give students an active role in learning and create an entirely new level of scaffolding for students, which we as adults don't quite fit into. It enables students to take their thinking and articulate it into words, which allows their brains to build and make connections that would typically not occur. Furthermore, the listening component of buddy talking allows students to hear the thinking of their peers, which helps them to clarify their own thoughts.

Teachers can utilize buddy talking in many ways, every day: formative assessments, simultaneous engagement, closing a lesson, discussion of vocabulary, breaking down of concepts by students, and connecting with prior knowledge. However, the prime purpose for buddy talking is to provide students with another opportunity to connect with the new learning in order to make it their own.

Let's Break it Down!
There are 5 steps that will help to ensure that effective buddy talking is occurring in your classroom:

Plan - When planning your lesson, plan specific times when buddy talking will be imperative to student understanding. Write questions ahead of time to ensure that they are higher level, and not formed "off the cuff." Also, make sure that your questions build on one another, which lends to ideal scaffolding opportunities. Write questions on post-its and place them in the text to indicate where questions should be asked. In guided reading, I have my own copy of the text we are reading, which has the questions written in it before we read. This way I remember what questions I asked at certain points in a novel discussion, and will have them for the next time I'm teaching the novel.

Pose - When posing the question, make sure you have strategically paired up your students with other students who can initiate thoughtful conversations. Your ESL learners should be paired with a student with an average vocabulary. Your higher students should be paired with higher leveled thinkers, and your average students can be paired with average to high-average thinkers. Have students sit criss-cross, knee to knee, so they can see eye to eye. Also give students indicators of who's talking first. I like to have students pick whether they would like to be Partner Peanut Butter or Partner Jelly, Partner Rain or Partner Boot, etc. Then you tell them who's talking first.

Wait - Students must have an adequate amount of wait time after you ask the initial buddy talk question. The average teacher waits 3 seconds for a student answer, however most students need 10-15 seconds, or more, to formulate an answer. The higher leveled questions that we should be asking to align with the Common Core sometimes incorporate two or more components, which will require adequate wait time for students. During this wait time, repeat the question, as well as provide supporting questions and scaffolds where appropriate.

Monitor & Feedback - Students should take turns talking. Explicit buddy talking that is intended to lead to a deeper understanding should include opportunities for students to listen to each other's thoughts. The teacher, should also be listening to students as they are responding, to check for understanding. Monitoring conversations will also help teachers to provide feedback, clarify misunderstandings, and ensure that all students are appropriately engaged. Monitoring will also enable teachers the opportunity to identify students whose thinking will benefit the entire group. I try to choose 2-3 students who have mastered the intended understanding, included key vocabulary, and made higher leveled connections that other students might not have made on their own.

Write - In the final steps of buddy talking, students should have an opportunity to solidify their understanding by piecing together their original thoughts, as well as thoughts they heard throughout the buddy talking session. Writing can serve as a formative assessment for the teacher to identify students who have built the connections and learning intended.

One last thing you can do to help students be successful buddy talkers throughout the year is to set up an environment so students have access to a natural buddy. My students sit facing another student, which allows a natural pairing. I also have control over the seating chart, so their buddy can be changed based on the needs of students.

Here are a few resources to look at if you'd like more information on buddy talking:

In the end, however it's phrased: Buddy Talk, Think-Pair-Share, Accountable Talk, Classroom Chat, Turn and Talk, and many others, we just need to get our kiddos talking! Any opportunity for students to make connections with new learning is critical and essential to student understanding in the Common Core Classroom. BUILD those connections, CHALLENGE that thinking, and give students the tools to DISCUSS!

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One of the goals the writers of The Common Core Standards had in mind was to build natural collaboration and discussion strategies within students, helping to prepare them for higher levels of education and collaboration in the workforce. In our Common Core classrooms today, students are being asked to incorporate multiple strategies, complex texts, and evidence-based responses.

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Research: Video Pitt for Coursera about accountable talk 

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Research: Video Pitt for Coursera about accountable talk 

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Free Online Course: Accountable Talk®: Conversation that Works from Coursera | Class Central

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Designed for teachers and learners in every setting - in school and out, in formal learning environments or at home - this course is an introduction to the theory and practice of well-structured talk that builds the mind.

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Accountable Talk in the Classroom: Educators Make Shifts to Encourage Instructional Discourse

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By: Alicia Wetherbee, Amanda Lynch, Kathy Flaherty, Monique Golden, and Jasmine Rudd

This investigation examined the impact of teacher-modeled instructional discourse on student accountable talk within content areas of our K-2 classrooms and library media. It made use of explicit instruction and modeling to encourage accountable talk across grade levels and settings. Teachers noted how student engagement and understanding increased when the conversational flow was less teacher directed and multi-directional between and among students as well as between teacher and students during learning. During the course of this research participating teachers used self-assessment and group reflection to inform instruction as well as careful planning, rich literature, modeling, and sentence stems throughout their lessons in reading and language arts. Through a gradual release model, the students became more independent in their conversations. As the research continued, they incorporated student discourse opportunities into other content areas such as math, writing, science, and social studies. A major finding in our research was the importance and value in providing time for student academic discourse to think critically and obtain new learning.

Breaking the Initiate, Response, Evaluate, Pattern: Let Them Talk!

Traditionally, discussion in the classroom is comprised of teacher initiation, student response, and ending in teacher evaluation which perpetuates the Initiate, Response, Evaluate (IRE) pattern (Mehan, 1979). In contrast, accountable talk within the classroom is significant because students are expected to participate in purposeful interchanges in which meaning can be developed, strengthened, revised, and extended. With the shifts in Common Core students need to share and articulate their thinking as well as listen to their peers. By incorporating accountable talk in the primary grades, we are creating a foundation for future rigorous learning and everyday social interactions. Oftentimes, classrooms have more teacher talk than student talk, however, students can become independent thinkers and thoughtful responders through opportunities to engage in discourse. Accountable talk is an opportunity for educators to make shifts in their instructional discourse patterns to impact academic gains and student learning.

Literature Review

Oral Language

The seminal work on the functions of language in the classroom (Cazden, John, & Hymes 1972) launched a new direction for inquiry into language and literacy learning. Historically socialization and language acquisition had been considered separate entities. Then Vygotsky's notion of instructional oral scaffolds played a critical role in the development of theory and research on language and literacy learning. Through dialogue and associated nonverbal interactions, teachers provide assistance to learners by modeling higher levels of conceptual and communicative competence within their zone of proximal development (ZPD). Scaffolding strategies like directive and supportive techniques provide assistance to students in attaining higher levels of language and literacy learning. Directive scaffolds parallel the direct instruction or skills-emphasis model of instruction (Pressley, 1998; Pressley & McCormick, 1995). Direct teaching is a straightforward, explicit teaching technique. Supportive scaffolds are learner-centered instruction that value learning as a search for understanding, provide opportunities for responsive feedback, and view the educational process as occurring within a community of learners (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking 1999). Supportive scaffolds mirror Vygotskian theory that holds to the idea that what learners are able to do today with assistance within their ZPD, they will be able to do tomorrow independently (Vygotsky, 1962).

Collaborative Instructional Approaches

The basic form for instructional conversations integrates listening, speaking, reading, and writing as tools of inquiry. Instructional conversations, when organized by thematic units, include activation of background knowledge (Goldenberg & Patthey-Chavez, 1995), and support development of new educational concepts. Through collaborative conversations, students invest in their own learning, seeking out challenging concepts in order to "form, express, and exchange ideas in speech and writing" (Tharp & Gallimore, 1998, p. 23). Over the past three decades, there has been much research done on how peers influence one another's learning. Teachers can allow for peer learning by using many different approaches such as cooperative reading and writing groups, conservation groups, questioning the author, and literature discussions (Webb & Palincsar, 1996).

Student Centered Instruction

Social Organization

Integrating accountable talk into classroom discourse is related to the social organization of the classroom. Based on the original work of Mitzel (1960, as cited by Dunkin & Biddle, 1974) a model of teacher effectiveness was necessary in order to capture the interactions between teaching and learning. The traditional conception of the classroom indicates that the role of the teacher is at the front of the class, while the responsibility of the student is to answer when called upon by the teacher. This traditional structure and organization of the classroom assumes that the classroom life is simply made up of the teacher being the questioner and students answering those questions (Mehan, 1979). Students want to participate and be accountable for their own learning. When students are involved in student centered classrooms, the social organization of the classroom includes organizing their course of study and deciding the length of their study (Mehan, 1979). Therefore students and teachers are interconnected through verbal and nonverbal discourse such as hand raising to speak or a head nod to acknowledge who speaks next (Byers & Byers, 1972; Erikson & Shultz, 1977). Overall, "Teachers and students work in concert to create this organization" (Mehan, 1979, p. 10).

Initiation-Reply-Evaluation Pattern (IRE)

It is important to notice the patterns in teacher-student interactions in order to enhance accountable talk in the classroom. Teachers can reflect on their own discourse practices to inform themselves as to how information is delivered to and practiced by students. In a seminal study on classroom discourse, Mehan (1979) suggested that the classroom interaction was lost in the Flander's system of tabulation; therefore, Mehan (1979) observed interaction between the student and teacher through initiations, replies, and evaluations (IRE) during the opening and conducting of the lesson. The initiations produced an answer and immediately after a reply, Mehan (1979) found that the teachers positively or negatively evaluated the reply of the student. His findings suggest that evaluation plays a significant role in instructional discourse. Students, alongside teachers, must be accountable to the learning community, accountable to accurate knowledge, and accountable to rigorous thinking. This type of accountability will not happen if students simply participate in the initiate-reply-evaluate sequence of a traditional classroom.

Discourse in Peer Led Discussions

Clearly, formats which go beyond traditional question/response interaction and allow students to initiate talk or engage in more autonomous talk are necessary if students are to learn how to do certain things with words-make polite requests, show interest, explain their needs, decide what to talk about, or change topics." (Knutson, 2001, p. 1141).

Suggestive Feedback

"There is no assumptions that there is one single correct answer or one single way to apply a strategy" (Pearson & Gallagher, 1983, p. 37). A variation in response is expected and should be encouraged. Rather than providing corrective feedback in which the teacher gives the correct answer or strategy when a student fails, a teacher should provide suggestive feedback. In this model, a teacher would praise the student for applying parts of the strategy correctly and encourages the student to examine other strategies that could be used to attack the problem. This type of feedback would help students to learn how to successfully apply multiple strategies to the same problem, which would allow the students to learn that every answer can be found in a variety of ways. Through monitored and student initiated conversations, the students were praised and the teacher modeled another question (Palincsar & Brown, 1986). Providing students with suggestive feedback and times to participate in conversations allows students to become more active participants so they can construct meaning and improve their understanding.

Guided Practice

Guided practice works together with reciprocal teaching in that the teacher and students are working together with the single goal of understanding the text. Through using guided practice and a gradual release of responsibility, the teacher is able to explicitly teach reading strategies and appropriate ways to independently apply such strategies. As time goes on, the teacher slowly steps back and allows the students to practice these strategies with guidance and support. This element is also the most critical stage (Pearson & Gallagher, 1983). Finally, the students are expected to use these strategies independently across multiple texts. An element of guided practice is similar to reciprocal teaching in that the students are taking on the role of the teacher, but the teacher is still there to switch roles and to monitor student progress and provide guidance.

Conclusion

Our study is informed by the above research and in particular connects to the work of Eeds and Wells (1989) as it monitors the interactions between students with their peers and students with the teacher. The use of accountable talk in a group discussion across content areas may lead to the fading of the teacher as the only facilitator and eventually allowing students to manage their own discussions with meaningful and relevant contributions. This allows students to take ownership of their learning and be accountable to their community, acquire accurate knowledge and rigorous thinking. This study seeks to examine how teachers can create a culture in which student discussion drives the learning. More specifically our research questions include:

1. How do selected interventions impact student accountable talk?

2. How can we incorporate student accountable across content areas?

Methodology

This qualitative study considered what happened when teachers planned for and provided explicit modeling and instruction of accountable talk. The intervention consisted of increasingly integrating accountable talk across content areas such as reading, writing, math, science, and social studies throughout the day. Teachers planned for this discourse to occur in the lessons where talk moves, as described by Wolf, Crosson, & Resnick (2006) were modeled in the areas of accountability to the learning community, accountability to accurate knowledge, and accountability to rigorous thinking. The components that were measured were teacher perspective on integration of accountable talk and student use of conversation starters. Baseline data was collected and additional data was analyzed to measure growth over time.

Research Subjects

Opportunistic or emergent sampling was employed to select the participants; this involved about 360 students spanning three grade levels including kindergarten, first grade, and second grade as well as library media. Participants were drawn from five different schools representing urban and suburban contexts. Teachers served in the role of participant observers in their respective classes and in one instance the researcher transitioned from participant observer to solely an observer when a student teacher assumed responsibility for her classroom (table 1).

Students at the primary level were chosen to be the sample because of the shifts in the Common Core and the importance of speaking and listening to prepare students for college and career readiness. As teachers of children at the primary level, our goal was discover ways to establish a foundation for accountable talk. Students were expected to elaborate, justify, clarify, and support ideas with relevant details and examples from text, personal, or real world experiences across all content areas.

Data Collection Process and Analysis

Baseline Data. Before starting our research, we wanted to complete a self-assessment to get baseline data in order to determine what areas we needed to work on. In order to do this, we tallied each time we allowed for accountable talk during the academic day by reflecting on our anecdotal notes. Researchers met weekly and conducted ongoing analysis of the effective implementation of talk move or strategies in which we would modify our understandings and identify patterns across classrooms.

To ensure data collection consistency across classrooms, researchers discussed and clarified the strategy for prompting to ensure that teachers were only tallying when they had to prompt students based on their behavior. Additionally, more categories of talk moves emerged in our ongoing analysis as we discovered students using other talk move stems that might not be on our tally sheet but still required rigorous thinking. We collected data using various forms throughout the eight weeks. Data sources included anecdotal notes, talk moves and strategies checklist.

Anecdotal Notes Template. Our instrument to obtain information was primarily the field notes ( see Figure 1 ) recorded by each researcher individually. We created the field notes organizer based on our two focus questions. When the researcher was a participant observer, they made small notes on post-its to keep track of their reflections during the teaching and then transferred those thoughts onto the field notes in a more extensive reflection at the end of the school day in all content areas. Some researchers became non-participants throughout the study, therefore these researchers kept field notes through the duration of the lessons that provided opportunities for accountable talk. Anecdotal notes were also taken when reviewing checklist data. These notes were analyzed in order to recognize any themes within the study.

Talk Moves Checklist. A Talk Moves checklist (See Figure 2) was adapted from Accountable Talk in Reading Comprehension Instruction , (Wolf, Crosson, & Resnick, 2006) . The Talk Moves checklist recorded the teacher/student accountability to the learning community, accountability to accurate knowledge, and accountability to rigorous thinking during the lesson. This checklist provided researchers with specific sentence stems for teacher linking and student responses.

Strategies Checklist. A strategies checklist (See Figure 3) was compiled from ideas and concepts that were found in research articles that support best practice. The checklist was designed to track teaching strategies used by the researchers, such as, planning, wait time, visuals, pairing for success, monitoring for accountable talk, and teacher prompting. These strategies were tallied based on number of times used in each subject area.

Preliminary Findings

After selecting our topic it was important to determine our baseline data. This data would provide the researchers with valuable information as far as the areas in which to increase instruction and to promote accountable talk. In order to do this, the researchers tallied each time they provided an opportunity for accountable talk. They also took anecdotal notes on anything they noticed or found relevant while teaching. We discovered how little we actually allowed for students to be discussing their thoughts and learning. Through this individual and group self-assessment, it was noted that accountable talk does not come naturally into a lesson. According to the baseline data, accountable talk was included solely during interactive read alouds. We, as teachers, were only asking for rigorous thinking during guided reading groups or in the literacy block. Across all classrooms in this study, accountable talk did not occur in other content areas as it was not planned for in the lessons.

Turn and talk is one activity that has been included in the literacy block in the k-2 classrooms of this study. Turn and talk was used but behaviors and how to talk were not explicitly modeled or discussed. The teachers stayed in the teaching chair and listened from afar and would have students individually share what they had shared with their partner. As the teachers observed this activity, it was noted that some students quickly turned to the person next to them while others were unwilling to turn and talk to the person next to them. The teachers also noticed that students didn't always understand what they were being asked to discuss or just were off task.

Data showed there was very little time set aside for the students to turn and talk to a partner or to work with their peers to gain understanding of a text. The average time allotted for the reading mini lesson was approximately 25 minutes. During the mini lessons teachers spent about twenty minutes or more talking. This means that for at least 50% of the lesson the students were sitting passively and were not fully engaged in their learning. The teacher did not ask students to support their ideas with evidence based on the text. Instead a question was posed and a student was called on to answer. In a typical lesson, only six to seven students were called upon. This perpetuated the initiate, reply, and evaluate (IRE) pattern of teacher and student interactions. We were clearly stuck in the pattern of asking a question of students in the whole group setting and responding to that student directly to confirm that their answer was correct or incorrect. We were not using teacher linking or teacher moves to help students talk to each other or helping students develop their own thinking. In general, teachers were dominating the talk in the classroom. Much of the time spent with students consisted of students listening to instruction, evaluation, and redirection. Because we were not purposely planning accountable talk, we were constantly falling back into the IRE pattern. While there were anchor charts posted and referred to in the classroom, they did not always encompass expectations or sentence stems for student discourse. It really became another decoration on the wall.

The importance of this preliminary data set the stage for the rest of the study. In our ongoing and formal analysis of the data, there were individual findings as well as five key findings across contexts.

Context

This study took place in 5 separate classrooms spanning grades k-2. Three suburban and two urban settings were included in this study. It is important to note that there were four grade level classrooms and a library media specialist that serviced students across grades k-2. While each of the classrooms were in different districts, there were some similarities in the level of support, structure of content area lessons, and individual student needs in the classroom (see table 2).

Findings

Over the course of the eight week study, consistent themes were found in the triangulation of data across settings. The first theme was that gradual release of responsibility gave the teachers a framework in which to purposefully plan for accountable talk across all content areas. The lesson plan made use of the original framework of "I do", "we do", and "you do". We then incorporated "you do together" component as part of the gradual release of responsibility in the workshop model. The "you do together" aspect of the lesson incorporated the accountable talk between the students before they engaged in independent practice. This purposeful planning made accountable talk an imperative part of the lesson development and implementation. As we made the time for accountable talk, the student participation increased which was documented on the talk moves checklist. It was also noticed in the field notes and strategy checklist results that fewer behaviors needed to be addressed and students asked fewer questions during the independent practice as their partner talk was facilitated by teachers before they worked on their own.

Furthermore, teachers reflected that it was apparent that when they did not purposefully plan for accountable talk as there was limited student participation during the lesson. All teachers across settings commented that it was very easy to fall back into the IRE pattern of questioning when the "you do together" was not a part of the lesson plan or when the teacher felt pressed for time in the curriculum.

Alongside purposefully planning the integration of accountable talk in the workshop model or read aloud format, teachers reflected on the importance of selecting rich literature to facilitate discourse. Choosing a rich text led teachers to purposefully plan more thoughtful questions. Using literature that lends itself to deeper discussions, allowed the academic discourse to be more powerful because it provided opportunities for students to share various perspectives and opinions. Thus, student engagement increased as they explored their own positions and had consistent opportunities to respond to others' thinking through linking statements.

The second theme across contexts was that explicit modeling was a necessary scaffold to support accountable talk in their classroom. Students needed to see conversational behaviors and sentence stems modeled in order to appropriately engage in meaningful discourse. When students were able to see how the conversations should look and sound by teacher modeling of the appropriate behaviors and sentence stems, these behaviors transferred into the student conversations throughout all content areas. This transfer of application into other content areas was attributed to explicitly teaching students not only how to be a speaker, but how to respond as a listener. This fostered student accountability to the community as they were building on one another's ideas. Students became active listeners to the speaker in order to respond to their ideas with sentence stems such as "I agree/disagree with __because__" or "I agree with what you said, but I want to add that ____."

Alongside explicit modeling, the teachers utilized anchor charts to support student learning and referred to them across content areas. The more that we incorporated anchor charts and referred to them throughout the lesson as well as during the day, the more the students used them in their conversations. Students would often look at the behavioral expectations and sentence stems posted to frame their academic discourse. When anchor charts were not provided during turn and talk conversations, students were rarely on topic and the conversations were short lived. In contrast, when anchor charts were provided it was noted in the field notes that the conversations stayed on topic as students asked clarifying questions or extended one another's thinking. We attributed this positive change to explicit modeling and to the use of a visual reminder of the expected sentence stems provided on the anchor chart.

Also as we became accountable to the community by linking ideas, the students followed suit and increased their linking of ideas. It appears that this occurred because students were hearing the linking of ideas modeled by the teachers in the prompts and questions posed, and they were also provided with sentence stems on the anchor charts for use in conversations with peers.

The anchor chart not only held benefits for students, but were also held advantages for the teachers. We had the talk moves checklist close by during whole and small group lessons. These sentence stems and questions guided us to be accountable to the community, accountable for accurate knowledge, and rigorous thinking of students. It was observed by all teachers that the more we used the sentence stems on our mini anchor charts, the more comfortable we felt using them. As the weeks progressed, the talk move sentence stems became a part of our teacher discourse and didn't feel as forced or unnatural.

Overall, the gradual release of responsibility, anchor charts, and explicit modeling of behaviors and sentence stems enhanced student discourse in the classroom. However, it is important to note that daily reflection of one's practice aided the teachers in the implementation of accountable talk across content areas. Collecting data through the anecdotal notes and talk moves checklist was helpful in allowing time to concentrate on what the teacher was doing in the classroom and its impact on the students. Taking that time each day to reflect and generate ideas on how to improve for the next day was beneficial to teaching and learning, as it often times surrounded the idea that everything needed to be purposefully planned and modeled frequently.

Summary Findings

In our ongoing and formal analysis of the data we found the following five key findings across all contexts:

Social discourse doesn't just happen

Gradual release of responsibility allows students to build independence through facilitating accountable talk

Effective strategies can be used not only to teach content but student discourse

Conscious planning is integral in providing authentic opportunities for student discourse

Accountable talk builds a community of trust and responsibility for accurate knowledge and rigorous thinking

First Realization: Student Discourse Doesn't "Just Happen"

As the researchers looked closely at the common core speaking and listening standards, discussions centered on our common findings in the primary grades. As a whole, we found that students do not come into a grade level just knowing how to respectfully have academic discourse. From the very beginning they need lots of explicit modeling ranging from how to start, continue, and end conversations. The physical set-up of the classroom, the use of strategies such as teacher modeling, fish bowl activities, and videotaping so students can see what good academic discourse looks like and sounds like are some of the effective ways to support student discourse. In order to build student confidence it was critical that all students' thoughts were validated. As teacher researchers did this, their students felt safe in discussing their ideas.

Second Realization: Gradual Release of Responsibility

One theme that was found across contexts through ongoing analysis and triangulation of the data sources is that gradual release of responsibility allowed the students to build independence through facilita ting accountable talk. When purposefully planning for lessons the teacher researchers followed the gradual release of responsibility where the teacher models their thinking to solve or work through a concept ("I do"). Then the students actively participate in the thinking and conceptual understanding alongside the teacher ("we do"). The teacher then incorporated partner work where students practiced the skill/concept, but the teacher became the facilitator and listened into conversations ("you do together"). This is where many anchor charts were used to encourage accountable talk and sentence stems to support academic discourse. Finally, the students were sent off to independently practice ("you do").

Organizing and structuring lessons with the gradual release of responsibility in mind aided teacher researchers to have a foundation and a conscious space to include accountable talk across content areas. As the teacher researchers gradually released responsibility it was noticed in the weekly ongoing analysis that prompting for student behavior decreased as the explicit modeling through the gradual release increased. Teacher researchers were able to facilitate and check for understanding during the "you do together" which allowed the teacher researchers to identify students who needed more support before the independent practices. Therefore, students felt more confident about the content before working independently since they had the "you do together" with teacher facilitation to ensure success before they were on their own. Alongside fostering independence in students, the gradual release of responsibility embedded accountable talk in the lessons. This allowed students more exposure and practice with academic discourse. Students were actively engaged in the "you do together" portion of the lesson which gave them more opportunities to explore and explain their thinking to a peer. As students became more comfortable with academic discourse through the gradual release, they learned how to respond to and respect multiple perspectives that may be similar or different than their own. This fostered the importance that everyone's voice is important and each idea is valued. Overall the gradual release of responsibility gave teacher researchers a framework to make accountable talk a priority in the classroom, which in turn gave students the opportunity to take ownership of their learning.

Third Realization: Effective Strategies

While the strategies the teacher researchers used during the research were not new, all agreed they were important to the success of encouraging academic discourse among the students. As the study progressed, it was found that anchor charts and visuals were necessary to help reinforce behaviors conducive to rich conversations. Depending on the grade level, the charts were designed to meet the needs of the students with lots of visuals at the kindergarten level and an increasing amount of text as the grade level went up. It was also found that displaying the sentence stems around the room and even putting them in the middle of a table while the students met, encouraged them to begin their conversations and respond to their group members. To encourage all students to participate and have enough time to think about their responses, wait time was another strategy on which the teacher researchers focused. One of the most important things we needed to do was to plan for the academic conversations to occur. Choosing the right book that lends itself to higher order questions during the reading lesson and planning where to stop to allow for the students to pair and share was key. Finally, teacher prompting for the behaviors being encouraged as well as monitoring for accountable talk was a shift the teacher researchers had to consciously focus on in order to bring about the changes they were hoping to elicit in themselves as teachers and in their students.

Fourth Realization: Conscious Planning and Self-Assessment

The fourth realization researchers made was the conscious planning for student discourse and self-assessment. A tip all researchers found to be helpful is to be purposeful in your pairing of partnerships. We suggest that teachers use their knowledge of students to pair them up into partners. Depending on the activity, teachers might consider partnering students at different levels, while other activities might call for partnering students at the same level. Plan ahead and have these groupings in mind before teaching. Planning this ahead of time will also help with behavior management. Make discourse a priority in your planning. If you don't plan for it, it will not occur or will not occur as smoothly. Start with a content area with which you are comfortable. The classroom teachers found the language arts block to be the best area to start. Slowly, the researchers introduced accountable talk in the other content areas. Do not let the IRE pattern sneak up on you! It's very easy to slip back into this pattern. Self-assessing through the use of checklists and anecdotal notes allowed all researchers the ability to reflect daily and guide future purposeful planning for student discourse. Celebrate your successes often and use what didn't go so well as a learning tool.

Fifth Realization: Community of Trust and Responsibility

It is important to understand that accountable talk provides many benefits to the teacher and the learners, including the culture of respectful and responsible students. The use of polite sentence stems and the frequent practice of respectful dialogue help to shape the community created in the classroom. This community becomes filled with students that take ownership of their learning and are not afraid to take risks in the classroom. Students feel more comfortable trying a new concept or expressing themselves publicly. They have more to contribute to the classroom discussion and want to share their thoughts and ideas with peers. By allowing for this type of student dialogue, students are learning how to agree and respectfully disagree with varying viewpoints.

In order for this community to flourish, we suggest that teachers listen more attentively to their students. The students have a voice and what they have to say is important. As teachers, we pride ourselves on what we are able to communicate to our students, but it is unlikely that we listen to everything they want to share. Since all aspects of accountable talk should be modeled, it is critical to keep in mind that modeling the listening component is just as important as the sharing.

Conclusions

Incorporating accountable talk across content areas in k-2 classrooms supported the teacher in moving away from the IRE pattern. This in turn developed students who were more engaged and willing to take ownership of their own learning. Across all classrooms, students and teachers made progress in adapting and internalizing accountable talk across content areas. As teacher talk moves increased in linking ideas, ensuring accountability for accurate knowledge, providing information, and asking questions that invite rigorous thinking, student talk moves increased as well. The more the teacher used visual charts, sentence stems, and explicit modeling of academic discourse, teacher prompting for on task behaviors decreased over the eight week period. Purposeful planning was integral to our success in promoting accountable in our classrooms. Preparation of higher order questioning resulted in meaningful student-led conversations. Additionally, we attribute our successful implementation of accountable talk in our classrooms to the presence of wait time paired with less teacher talk. Overall, strategies such as planning, wait time, visuals, pairing for success, monitoring, and explicit modeling alongside talk moves (sentence stems) enhanced student discourse. Because this research project demanded a major shift which involved decreasing the amount of teacher talk and increasing the amount of student talk, the weekly group meetings helped to support these shifts. As we openly shared our successes and failures we were able to give each other ideas from week-to-week. In the end, we considered the time we had to reflect and collaborate was key to the success of our work.

Recommendations

In light of the results of this study we have the following recommendations for educators to incorporate accountable talk in the classroom. It is important to be cognizant of the amount of teacher talk versus student talk that is occurring in your classroom. For example, check the clock at the beginning and end of your teacher talk. Are you allowing students to discover concepts through peer discussions? We suggest that teachers make accountable talk a priority by embedding it into the lessons. Diligently planning for accountable talk and including the steps of gradual release of responsibility (I do, we do, you do together, and you do) is crucial to success. This will provide a framework for your thinking and will make accountable talk manageable in the classroom. We encourage teachers to willingly give up control in order to let your students lead the conversation and build on each other's ideas. This will take time and patience from both the teacher and students. Take one subject at a time and choose a content area you are most comfortable in to begin. As you begin, realize teachers have a role in accountable talk as a facilitator. It is beneficial to have the talk moves chart readily available to be mindful of the ways in which we can guide and support students in student-led conversations. To enhance student discourse, post sentence stems around the room and refer to them before, during, and after lessons. Anchor charts with sentence stems are to be actively used as teaching tools and are not merely decorations. At the conclusion of your day, reflect upon your own teaching. This can be done by having literacy coaches observe your teaching, or perhaps by videotaping or audio taping your lessons for your personal review. Opportunities for group self-reflection are key to your success, so if possible, work with your grade level team and plan weekly times to share insights and ideas. The strongest environment for developing accountable talk in the classroom is a school-wide initiative with supports in place to model and guide teachers through the process. This will promote common language and expectations vertically across all the grade levels. Schools should be places of rich learning and rich talk.

References

Bransford, J.D., Brown, A.L., & Cocking, R.R. (Eds.). (1999). How people learn: Brain, mind, experience, and school. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. Available: books.nap.edu/catalog/6160.html

Responsive Classroom (2016). What is morning meeting? Retrieved from https://www.responsiveclassroom.org/what-is-morning-meeting/

Wolf, K. M., Crosson A. C., & Resnick L. B. Accountable Talk in Reading Comprehension Instruction. (2006) Learning and Research Development Center, University of Pittsburgh. 1-24

About the Authors:

Kathleen Flaherty recently retired from Hop Brook Elementary School in Naugatuck where she taught library media and reading. She received her bachelor's degree in Elementary Education in 2006 and her Masters in Reading and Language Arts in 2013 from Central Connecticut State University. She now lives in Maryville Tennessee where she plans to continue her career as a teacher of reading.

Monique Golden second grade teacher in East Hartford, CT. I have been teaching in the district since January 2013. I have taught in grades 1, 2 and 5. I received my Master's degree in reading and language arts at CCSU in 2014. I enjoy teaching students the joys that come from reading!

Amanda Lynch graduated with her degree in education in 2009 from Central Connecticut State University. She completed her masters in Reading at Central Connecticut in 2015. She currently teaches kindergarten in Plainville and has been there for the past 5 years.

Jasmine Rudd currently teaches second grade in Gwinnett County, Georgia. She received her Masters degree in Reading and Language Arts at CCSU. She is also in the process of going back to school to further her education and better serve students in her community.

Alicia Wetherbee is currently a K-5 reading consultant in the Manchester Public School System. Previously she taught first, second, and fourth grade. Alicia graduated with her Masters in Remedial Reading from CCSU and is currently enrolled in CCSU's doctoral program for educational leadership.

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Accountable Talk in the Classroom: Educators Make Shifts to Encourage Instructional Discourse

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By: Alicia Wetherbee, Amanda Lynch, Kathy Flaherty, Monique Golden, and Jasmine Rudd This investigation examined the impact of teacher-modeled instructional discourse on student accountable talk within content areas of our K-2 classrooms and library media. It made use of explicit instruction and modeling to encourage accountable talk across grade levels and settings.

# data[].attributes.headline
Practical: What do I need to do to increase the level and quality of communication in my classroom? 

# data[].attributes.subject
Practical: What do I need to do to increase the level and quality of communication in my classroom? 

# data[].attributes.body
Prepare: What do you want  students to say/ work on? What do you want it to look like?
Develop: A plan of how you will gradually introduce accountable talk
Specific: What exactly do you want students doing?
Model and use anchor chart visual: Show students what this looks like-- Gradual release model:
I do, We do, You do
Practice:
Have high expectations - All students should be talking and following expectations.

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Turn and Talk: Why? What does this look like?

# data[].attributes.subject
Turn and Talk: Why? What does this look like?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
This strategy permits all students to participate in discussion, rather than only a few students participating in a class-wide discussion. All students are able to process new learning while engaging in meaningful conversation with a classmate.

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Accountable discussion empowers students to draw up arguments based on evidence. Students learn how to respect the views of their peers while strengthening their communication skills. They get practice in being good conversationalists, participating in conversations in a polite manner.

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by Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey and Carol Rothenberg

The best way to get a good idea is to get lots of ideas.

-Linus Pauling

It's a safe bet that the Nobel Prize-winning chemist and peace activist Linus Pauling didn't arrive at all of his good ideas by remaining silent. Chances are very good that there was a lot of talk going on at his Caltech lab as he and his colleagues worked out the problem of electronegativity and its relationship to ionic bonds between atoms. (Talk about academic discourse!) Of course, this didn't occur in an unruly or chaotic environment; the learning goals and social rules of conversations were just as important there as in any classroom.

As educators, we know that learning is social and that peer interactions help extend understanding. The idea that peers can scaffold new learning effectively for one another was one of Lev Vygotsky's great contributions to our field. Yet many teachers are reluctant to turn the class over to collaborative learning, for fear that they will lose control and thus lose valuable instructional time. We don't base this claim on observation alone. A study of the experiences of 1,000 elementary students across the United States found that they spent 91 percent of their days in either whole-group or independent seatwork, with only 4.8 percent engaged with peers in a learning activity (Pianta, Belsky, Houts, & Morrison, 2007). It isn't for lack of teacher knowledge, either, as 90 percent of the teachers held a credential, and 44 percent possessed a master's degree.

Moving into English with Peers

As we have stated throughout this book, English language learners need lots of opportunities to apply their growing knowledge in order to learn English and learn in English. Their acquisition of academic language is certainly initiated through the modeling of teachers and reinforced and extended through classroom discourse. In addition, teachers provide more specific supports during small-group guided instruction. This approach does have its limits, however. For example, Zwiers's (2007) study of the practices of middle school teachers found that in too many cases the questions they posed to English language learners differed in complexity (concrete versus abstract) and the teachers accepted more superficial answers from these students than they did from native speakers in the same class.

Zwiers posited that students who speak English as a first language arrive in school with a higher "academic capital" that allows them to speak a school type of language that is valued (2007, p. 94). Therefore, they are more adept at using the discourse of comparing and contrasting, interpretation, evaluation, and description. But many English language learners, especially those at the secondary level, report that they have limited opportunities to interact with native speakers in their classes and that this is a factor in the separateness between the two student groups (Daoud & Quiocho, 2005).

Even in the very best of classrooms, the ones in which teachers ask sophisticated questions of English language learners and provide prompts to guide their students' thinking, learning is stunted without peer interactions. Marzano, Pickering, and Pollock's (2001) analysis of effective instructional strategies identifies cooperative learning with peers as one of nine research-based strategies with a large effect size (.78). In particular, small-group interactions with peers offer several benefits for English language learners:

Repetition of key words and phrases;

Functional, context-relevant speech;

Rich feedback; and

Reduced student anxiety. (Hill & Flynn, 2006, p. 56)

Although we believe a strong research base exists for creating opportunities for students to work together, we also recognize the reluctance many teachers have about using such an approach. Some have concerns about management-a fear of the proverbial cocktail party breaking out and an exhausting attempt to restore order-and some labor under the misconception that real learning can occur only under a teacher's direct instruction. In the following section, we will describe a set of principles for managing academic discourse among peers and specific strategies that foster learning English while learning in English.

Managing Classroom Talk to Enhance Learning

The talk of the classroom is necessarily academic in nature and includes a variety of cognitive functions that help students explain their thinking and learn from others. For instance, students need to be able to compare and contrast ideas, ask questions, and describe phenomena. We find it useful to provide sentence starters related to the different types of thinking necessary in any learning environment. We post these sentence starters around the room and refer to them during guided instruction. In addition, we remind students of the language objectives for the types of language they will use in their collaborative learning activity. A copy of the poster we use in our classes appears in Figure 5.1.

When students are learning a new language, their receptive skills typically develop in advance of their productive skills. English language learners may indeed understand the discussion in a classroom, but they may have difficulty finding the language they need to express the depth and complexity of their thinking. Using sentence frames can relieve the linguistic load, allowing students to focus on the content while they practice academic language. Some educators may argue that this framing of language results in shallow and contrived discourse, stifling critical thinking. And indeed, when students first begin to use these frames, their language will likely sound stilted and rehearsed. But then, isn't that the natural progression of learning any new skill? First we watch, then we mimic, and then we begin to appropriate, adjusting our use of the skill to suit our own style. Linguistic frames serve as a way to scaffold and differentiate both oral and written tasks for students at different levels of language proficiency. In this way we make the register, the style, and the word choice explicit, identifying the rhetorical moves that are appropriate to the purpose and the context and helping students make their meaning clear.

Linguistic frames can be used at any level-from beginning language learners to native speakers, from kindergartners to adolescents. Harvard University education professor and author Howard Gardner even asks postdoctoral fellowship applicants to use them to guide their responses: "Most scholars in the field believe _______" and "As a result of my study, ________" (Graff & Birkenstein, 2006). Examples of linguistic frames related to cause and effect can be found in Figure 5.2.

Figure 5.2. Cause and Effect Linguistic Frames

Not available for electronic dissemination.

Source: A Focused Approach to Constructing Meaning: Explicit Language for Content Instruction

The academic language of the speaker is only one side of the equation-the listener also has responsibilities. Beyond basic social expectations regarding polite behavior, true discussion needs the active participation of others if there is to be an exchange of ideas. Lauren Resnick (1995) introduced the concept of accountable talk as a means of raising the level of academic discourse among students. Accountable talk governs the norms of academic discourse and requires that students ask for and furnish evidence to support their statements (Michaels, O'Conner, Hall, & Resnick, 2002). This ensures rigor and moves the conversation from task-oriented to concept-oriented learning.

In a classroom filled with accountable talk, students ask one another about their thinking and build on the responses of others. They cite evidence, ask for elaborations and clarifications, and extend understandings by using the statements they have heard from their classmates to form new ideas. We place a table card on each group's desk at the start of each collaborative learning activity to reinforce the need for holding oneself (and each other) accountable for rigorous discussion (see Figure 5.3).

Students take quickly to accountable talk, and many appreciate the guidelines because they prevent conversations from going astray. For example, consider the following conversation in Ms. Hirano's 2nd grade class as four students discuss an ant diagram during science. They have been asked to talk about the ways that insects communicate and to decide what body parts are used by the ant:

Kristina: Well, I know they touch.

Roberto: But how do you know? You can't just say "you know." [requesting evidence]

Kristina: 'Cause I seen them wave their-their-what are those pointers on their heads?

Ting: Right here [points to diagram]. Antennae. [offering evidence]

Kristina: Yeah, antennae. They use their antennae to touch each other.

Alejandra: We're s'posed to use that word. Ms. Hirano wrote it on the board-antennae. They touch their antennae to see each other. [using ideas from others]

Ting: Do they have eyes on their antennae? Show me? [requesting evidence]

Alejandra: [examines diagram closely] I don't see eyes. [giving evidence]

Roberto: The eyes is here [points to label that reads "eyes"].

Kristina: Oh, yeah, that's right! They can see! They use their eyes to see. [using ideas from others]

Ting: Look how teeny they are. They must not see a lot of stuff.

This is a typical accountable talk interaction among young children and is all the more remarkable because it doesn't sound contrived. They still think and speak as 7-year-olds, but the difference is that they are listening to one another instead of speaking in parallel. In addition, the conversation hasn't wandered from the topic, because the students are accustomed to working together like this. Taken together, the language goals and accountable talk guide the academic discourse of the group, without imposing an artificial structure that limits students' thinking.

Of course, these four students didn't end up together through happenstance. Ms. Hirano created a heterogeneous group of students with varied content knowledge, language proficiency, and social styles. In the next section, we will discuss grouping considerations for managing talk in the classroom.

Managing Talk Through Grouping

Although there may be a certain surface logic to grouping students homogeneously, the preponderance of the evidence shows that students of all abilities perform better in heterogeneous groups (Lou et al., 1996). It comes as no surprise that low-achieving students do worse in homogeneous groups because they collectively have fewer resources to draw from ( r = -.60). There is a very small positive effect for high-achieving students when grouped homogeneously (.09), but average-achieving students benefit significantly (.51) from mixed-ability grouping (Lou et al., 1996).

The composition of the members plays a role in the relative success of a group. Bennett and Cass (1988) looked at the performance of groups where either the high-achieving students outnumbered the low-achieving ones or vice versa. They concluded that groups that were dominated by high-achieving students performed worse because the low-achieving student was left out of the process. This did not occur when high-achieving students were the minority in the group. A formula of two low-achieving students for every one high-achiever or two English language learners for every one proficient speaker may not be feasible for every classroom, but it is worth noting so as not to inadvertently set up groups that leave learners behind.

Achievement should not be the only factor taken into consideration when grouping students. Flexible grouping patterns that allow students to work with many classmates over time build relationships and broaden students' learning experiences. After all, the workplace is rarely a homogeneous environment-we are called upon daily to interact and work with people who possess a range of strengths and areas of need. Flexible grouping patterns are based on variables such as these:

Language proficiency level: Students may be grouped together for a language lesson or heterogeneously to provide language models and facilitate sustained conversation.

Primary language: Students work with others who speak the same language, allowing them to discuss new and complex topics in a familiar language.

Skills development: Students are grouped together because they are working on the same skill.

Interest: Students study a shared topic of interest or are spread among groups to serve as motivators.

Work habits: Students are spread among groups to model work habits.

Prior knowledge of content: Students are grouped to share topical knowledge.

Prior knowledge of strategies: Students are organized to share strategic knowledge.

Task or activity: Students are grouped together because the task or activity has been designed to meet their needs.

Social: Students are spread among groups to serve as leaders or in other specialized roles.

Random: Random grouping ensures that students come into contact with all members of the class and build community.

Student choice: This pattern gives friends an opportunity to work together (Flood, Lapp, Flood, & Nagel, 1992).

To form effective groups, you must know your students well. When your classroom includes English language learners, you must be keenly aware of their proficiency levels in English as well as their understanding of the content of the task. Placing one student who is new to English in a group of proficient students may seem like a good idea, but in actuality, that student is likely to participate more with students whose level of proficiency in English is closer to his or her own: the English language learner will not feel as intimidated, and the other students may have more empathy and understanding of how the student feels. And, although it can be helpful to assign a buddy to a student who has just arrived with no English, be careful that the buddy does not do all the work and become a caretaker. Rotating buddies periodically relieves the burden of being the "teacher" and helps the new student get to know more members of the class.

Obviously, the ability to group and regroup students depending on the purpose of the task requires a physical arrangement of the room that facilitates movement. In Chapter 4, we saw how two different teachers organized their classrooms to allow for this flexibility. In some classrooms, the only solution to flexible grouping is to ask students to physically move their desks or chairs. At first glance, this activity may seem like an invitation to bedlam that takes valuable time away from instruction, but with a bit of guidance, students can learn to do this quickly and efficiently.

Students, especially those in elementary school, express a preference for working in mixed-ability groups (Elbaum, Schumm, & Vaughn, 1997). Students identified as gifted and talented in grades 5-11 acknowledged the social development benefits of working in heterogeneous groups (Adams-Byers, Whitseel, & Moon, 2004). When collaboration with peers becomes routine rather than anomalous, students settle into a pattern of work that is productive without being disruptive. Of course, managing noise and time also contributes to the smooth operation of the class.

Managing the Noise and Time of Talk

We believe that mismanagement of noise and time poses the biggest barrier to teachers' use of collaborative learning and goes a long way toward explaining the dearth of partner and small-group work in classrooms. Although school administrators understand that a quiet classroom does not necessarily equate to a learning classroom, most of us worry that the hum of activity could devolve into the clamor of chaos and that our teaching reputations will be sullied in the process. This concern may be especially true for new teachers, who know they are under scrutiny and don't want anyone to think they have classroom management problems. Even the best-designed collaborative task can be diminished by poor procedures that fail to take noise and time into account.

Managing Noise

Many children find it difficult to concentrate on the learning at hand when the din grows too loud. Much of the problem, we have discovered, is that students haven't had much experience at individually and jointly modulating noise levels, leaving it to the teacher. When working with young children, we sing the following verse from the campfire song "John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt," repeating it in a progressively softer voice until we are down to a whisper:
John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt
His name is my name, too.
Whenever we go out,
The people always shout,
There goes John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt
Tra la la la la la la
This activity is a great way to teach about volume and musical dynamics. We pair it with a visual representation of the volume using a noise meter (see Figure 5.4). There's nothing fancy about this aid-it is made using a large piece of corrugated cardboard, and the arrow is attached using a brad. We introduce the vocabulary terms silent, quiet, moderate, elevated, and outdoor voice and simulate those levels using the song. Older elementary students don't need the song, so instead we use a lamp with a dimmer switch-the lower the light, the quieter the class is expected to be. We practice being silent for 56 seconds, or working quietly for 24 seconds, or speaking moderately for 38 seconds, so that students gain tangible experience with understanding the relative levels of sound.

Figure 5.4. Noise Meter

Source: The Effective Teacher's Guide: 50 Ways for Engaging Students in Learning

We then tell our students that we will use these noise levels through our school year: silent when we are taking tests, quiet when working or reading independently, moderate-defined as loud enough to be heard by your partner but quiet enough not to interfere with another pair's conversation-when engaged in partner talk, and elevated only during small-group work. Of course, we never use an outdoor voice inside the classroom!

The noise meter is introduced on the first day of school and is revisited each time we move into independent work, collaborative learning, and guided instruction. Before long, the visual cue is no longer needed, and the verbal direction alone suffices. When the noise level does get too loud, we stop the class and redirect attention to the noise meter. We have seen other colleagues use variations of the noise meter, like a traffic light or a large "noise thermometer" with a red ribbon representing the mercury inside the tube. One of our secondary science colleagues begins the year by teaching students about the science of acoustics and the effects of noise on learning. The common denominator in all of these examples is drawing students' attention to sound levels in the classroom and giving them an active role in monitoring it.

Managing Time

As we discussed in Chapter 3, releasing responsibility to students to talk with each other and construct their own meaning takes more time than simply telling them what we want them to know and asking a few questions of a few students to assess their understanding. It becomes particularly important, therefore, that we manage time effectively. By the time children are 8 years old, they show time-monitoring patterns that are similar to those of adults (Mäntylä, Carelli, & Forman, 2007). The rate at which they check clocks increases as time elapses, with fewer checks early on in a task. However, students aren't always as good at figuring out how much time is left. Setting a bell to ring at the end of an activity gets their attention, but it doesn't allow them to adjust their rate to meet the time requirements. A simple solution is to provide students with a means to monitor the time remaining. Countdown timers can be displayed using an overhead or a projector. In the absence of this kind of device, you can post descending numbers of variable intervals on the board and cross each off as the time elapses. For example, in a 15-minute assignment, post the numbers 13, 10, 7, 5, 3, 2, and 1 to reflect the increased clock checking that students will do. An added benefit of an overhead timer or chalkboard countdown is that it helps the teacher monitor time as well.

Managing Linguistic and Cultural Diversity

Noise and time management aside, another challenge in using effective collaborative tasks is how to ensure that all students are actively engaged in learning. One common fear is that students will spend their time talking about topics that have nothing to do with the task at hand. There are also the issues of certain students dominating and doing all the work and of students who prefer to work independently. When we add in the elements of linguistic and cultural diversity, we add another dimension to the complexities of managing oral discourse in the classroom. Here again, purposeful and structured planning, along with teacher guidance and support, can maximize participation and learning for all students.

Managing Linguistic Diversity

For obvious reasons, it can be particularly uncomfortable for teachers when students are talking together in a language that the teacher does not speak. Using the primary language in the classroom, whether it is the teacher speaking or students, is a somewhat controversial practice. On one side of the argument are those who believe that students must use English to learn English and that time not spent in English is valuable learning time lost. They argue that, for many students, class time is the only time they are speaking English, because they may go home to communities where there is no need to do so. We wholeheartedly agree that one of the primary goals for our students is proficiency in English, but one of our other primary goals is understanding of grade-level content, which includes progressively more and more difficult concepts as students move up the grade levels.

Consider for a moment this scenario. You are in a class as a learner, studying a subject you are unfamiliar with-perhaps stoichiometry, tessellations, or corpus linguistics. Would you prefer to discuss these new ideas in your native language or in a new language that you are learning-say, Russian, Portuguese, or Amharic? Language choice, like grouping, depends on the purpose. There may be times when students will learn more if they can talk about new and difficult concepts in familiar language. Of course, we want to be sure they are talking about the new concept and that they are on the right track. So how do we do this?

First, when we have created the type of environment we described in Chapter 4, where students understand the purpose of talk, are used to talking, and know that their ideas are important, we can trust that students will value the time to discuss and clarify their understanding. Will they do so 100 percent of the time? Perhaps not, though we would argue that the percent of time on task is not proportional to which language students are using.

Second, we can monitor student talk in a language other than English in the same way we monitor students speaking in English, by sitting with the group and asking questions, in English, to gauge their understanding. They must respond in English, which gives them the opportunity to use the language and vocabulary we expect them to use, with the added support of having first had an opportunity to clarify their thinking in a familiar language.

Finally, accountability is built into all collaborative tasks. Teachers may require students to complete a graphic organizer, write a summary, create a skit, or present their conclusions to the class.

Even when we require students to complete and turn in a written product as part of their collaborative work, this task does not necessarily translate into engagement for all students. Without careful organization, one or two students can end up doing all the work. In the last chapter, we talked about how to teach students to share responsibility, contributing to the discussion and encouraging others to participate as well. In addition to teaching them about the importance of participation in group work, it can be helpful to set up systems and structures that require all students to participate.

We often see group work organized such that each student has a role. One student might be assigned to be the recorder; another, the facilitator; another, the questioner; and the fourth, the timekeeper. Unfortunately, all too often, it is the English language learner, the student who may be most in need of language practice, who is assigned the role of timekeeper-a role that requires little or no language and certainly no interaction with the content. Moreover, it is not even a necessary role; as we've already noted, there are other ways to help students manage their time. This is not to say that students should never be assigned roles. In Chapter 3, we saw Mr. Barber assign roles quite effectively when his students were first learning to do reciprocal teaching. The difference is that in that case, each role is equally important in making meaning. Mr. Barber's expectation is also that students will practice all roles and eventually, as they become more comfortable with the process, will no longer need to be assigned roles.

One way of assuring that all students participate and learn is a collaborative structure called "numbered heads together" (Kagan, 1992). Each group is assigned a number, and each student within the group is assigned a number from 1 to 4 (or 5 when the numbers don't work out evenly to 4). The teacher asks a question and tells students to make sure every student in the group can answer the question. After a predetermined amount of time, usually a minute or two or more, the teacher spins the overhead spinner and announces the number of the student who must answer, perhaps number 3. Groups then have one more minute to make sure that student number 3 in their group can answer the question. The teacher spins again and announces the number of the group that must respond. In this way, students support each other to make sure they all can answer because they never know who will be called on. This strategy is most effective when groups earn points for correct responses.

The other major problem with assigning roles is that only one student is the writer. We prefer to see that all students are required to write their own copies, whether of notes, a skit, or a graphic organizer. Obviously, when the task is to create a poster, this is not so simple. Later in this chapter, you will see how Ms. Chang builds in accountability as her students create a collaborative poster. Each student in the group selects a different colored pen, and all colors must appear on the poster in relatively equal amounts. (She uses this meaning of equality as an opportunity to reinforce understanding of percentage in her math class.) Ms. Chang also insists that, regardless of who is the best artist or who has the best handwriting in the group, all must do both writing and drawing on the poster.

Once we've resolved the issue of all students contributing to the creation of the product, we are left with the question of how to ensure that all students contribute to its presentation. Even when students have written a dialogue-say, to represent the main ideas and events of the westward movement-it may not have a part for all four students. Because we want all our students to practice speaking in more formal situations, we ask that all students present the dialogue even if it means that two students will recite one part chorally. If they are presenting a poster, we give them time to determine how they will organize their presentation so that all group members play an equally important role.

Managing Cultural Diversity

Another challenge to managing effective group work can be norms of behavior, whether they are individual differences in personality or more general differences in cultural practices. In some cultures it is considered inappropriate for boys and girls to work together. Students from other cultures may be used to working independently and may be uncomfortable working in a group. Because we live in a society where people work together at some point in virtually all careers and walks of life, it is important for students to be able to step outside this comfort zone and engage in whatever configuration they may find themselves. Teaching students to participate effectively while still recognizing, valuing, and allowing for these differences can be a delicate balance. As we create an environment that fosters teamwork, we can hold frank discussions about cultural and personal differences and the reasons for learning to work both independently and collaboratively. We can also vary the structures for learning, sometimes grouping girls with girls and boys with boys, for example. And for those students who prefer to work independently, we can negotiate with them, allowing them to work independently for part of a project or for certain projects and progressively moving them into more collaborative situations.

Setting Clear Expectations and Outcomes

In Chapter 3, we discussed the importance of making the purpose of each lesson clear to students in order to focus their attention and help to build schemas and understanding. Setting clear expectations and outcomes is also an important factor in managing group work effectively. Many of us have had the unfortunate experience of designing what we thought was an exciting and interesting collaborative task for our students, only to watch it go over like the proverbial lead balloon. Upon reflection, we may realize that the reason for the failure was not so much the lesson design but that students did not understand what we expected them to do. Asking students to work together is far more complicated than simply assigning the odd-numbered questions at the end of the chapter. It requires making the procedures of the task as well as the expectations for quality and substance of the outcome crystal clear for all students. This may mean showing models of completed work, writing the directions in addition to telling the students what to do, or modeling how to do the task (as we saw with the fishbowl). Posters of the steps involved in each collaborative task are one way of helping students learn what they are supposed to do.

Mr. Lopez, a 2nd grade teacher, and Ms. King, a 10th grade world history teacher, both use the same procedures to make sure students know what the assignment is. They write the steps of the task on an overhead or chart, tell the students what they will be doing, and then ask a student to tell the class what the first step is. They then ask another student to tell the class what the first student said. This repetition encourages all students to listen and has the added benefit for English language learners, who may have difficulty in comprehending multistep directions, of giving them multiple opportunities to hear the directions.

Managing Talk in Pairs

Partner talk is the bread and butter of a classroom filled with the talk of learning. Teachers most commonly invite students to "turn to a partner" to discuss the topic of the moment. As noted in Chapter 4, this simple partner-talk method should be used frequently to allow students lots of opportunities to apply new learning. But work accomplished in pairs is also done during collaborative learning activities designed to move students to an increased level of independence.

Busy Bees

In Chapter 3, kindergarten teacher Mr. Velez used the "busy bees" strategy to foster partner talk with his students as they shared their opinions about a recent visit to the zoo. This activity is suitable for children in kindergarten through 2nd grade. The teacher introduces the activity by explaining how bumblebees fly. The children, who are on their feet, mimic the buzzing sound and slow movement of bumblebees as they buzz around the room. With an announcement from the teacher of "Busy bees, fly!" the students shuffle their feet and buzz until they hear, "Busy bees, land!" The "bee" they are standing next to becomes their partner for a brief learning activity. For example, 1st grade teacher Ms. Tyler gives each of her students a few math cubes to hold in one hand, along with a sheet of paper and pencil attached to a clipboard. With each "landing," the partners add the total number of cubes and write an addition problem on their papers. Ms. Tyler uses this activity in place of math drill worksheets to provide practice for her students.

Walking Review

Busy bees is not developmentally appropriate for older students, but a walking review accomplishes similar goals. Like the "Find Someone Who ..." handout used for students to get to know one another, this activity is an excellent replacement for completing independent worksheets and for reviewing material. Each student in the class has a worksheet to be completed and is given a limited period of time to find someone else in the class who can answer each question. Students sign their names next to each answer they log onto someone else's worksheet, and no one can provide more than one answer on any given paper. The goal of this activity is to encourage students to speak to as many classmates as possible about the concepts under review.

Mr. Clark uses walking reviews every Friday in his 8th grade science class to review the week's lessons on chemical reactions. "This is a great way for me to use some of the worksheet materials that come with the textbook program," he explains. He sets the timer for 10 minutes and moves among the students as they roam the room looking for peers who can answer each question. To provide his English language learners with the support they need to approach fellow classmates, he meets briefly with those who need it to give them questions to ask (e.g., "Do you know the answer to number 3?"). When he has students who are very new to English, he partners them with another student to walk the room. "I get a really good sense of who knows something and who doesn't," he says. Mr. Clark asks students to complete the last question on the paper independently back at their desks. "As they all drift back to their seats, the room gets quieter, and I can gauge how much more time might be needed. And don't forget, it gets everyone back in their seats!"

Explorers and Settlers

As with busy bees and walking review, this instructional routine also requires students to move about the room. However, this approach offers a bit more crowd control because only half of the students are in motion. The teacher begins by reminding students about the differences between explorers, who sought out new lands, and settlers, who cultivated the land and built permanent communities. Assign half of the students to the role of explorers (a good way is to divide the alphabet by last name), and explain that they will seek out settlers to discuss a question.

Ms. Lee does this activity in a rotation of three or four discussion prompts in her 5th grade social studies class. After assigning the roles, she posts the following prompts on the board:

Discuss the ways of life of the Pueblo Indians of the Southwest.

Discuss the ways of life of the woodland peoples of the East.

What did these two groups have in common?

How did geography influence their different ways of life?

Ms. Lee used a countdown timer for each question so that the partners could monitor their discussion. As the timer approached zero, she invited the explorers to find a new settler and directed them to the next question.

There are variations of the explorers/settlers theme, including couch potatoes/aerobics instructors (physical education), electrons/protons (science), and carriers/borrowers (mathematics). Purposefully planning when using this strategy can scaffold language for students who are learning English. You can, for instance, assign students at early levels of proficiency to be explorers and then assign the settlers to be the first ones to speak. This approach provides an opportunity for English language learners to hear the language of other more proficient students and rehearse what they might say before they have to speak. When you ask them to repeat the process, it provides multiple opportunities for them to hear and use language related to the same question.

Inside/Outside Circles

In Chapter 3, Ms. Schmidt used inside/outside circles during her lesson in her 5th grade social studies class. This strategy also requires student movement and is intended to extend thinking through multiple conversations. Two concentric circles of students stand and face one another. The teacher poses a question to the class, and the partners talk for a brief time (usually 30-60 seconds). At the signal, the outer circle rotates one position to the left to face a new partner. The conversation continues for several rotations.

Mr. Garland uses inside/outside circles in his 10th grade English class to get discussion going about a thought-provoking question. "You've got to ask a good, meaty question," he cautions, "or they'll run out of things to say pretty quickly." His class will be reading a variety of titles to explore the essential question "When does the desire to obtain something or someone become destructive?" For several minutes, students explore this idea with a series of partners, while Mr. Garland listens in on the conversations. "It helps me to make connections to books I am going to discuss with them, and reminds me of what's in the heads of 15-year-olds."

Barrier Games

Much of what students are required to do in school is performance driven-solving math problems, completing science labs, and the like. A tremendous amount of academic discourse is needed to do such tasks, but English language learners sometimes rely on other methods of communication, such as gestures, to substitute for technical vocabulary. Barrier games are joint tasks completed by partners who have an obstruction blocking their field of view. For them to succeed, they must rely on clear communication and precise vocabulary. Here are some examples of barrier games:

Sequencing a set of pictures in the correct order to illustrate the steps to making and glazing a ceramic pot

Giving a partner directions to draw the life cycle of a butterfly

Describing the difference between two similar illustrations of molecules

Solving a crossword puzzle where each partner has half of the clues

Mr. Dare requires the students in his woodshop class to be able to correctly name each type of equipment used in the class. He assigns partners and places a low cardboard shield on the desk so that they cannot see the cards the other holds. One partner has an unlabeled photograph of a piece of shop equipment, while the other has written descriptions of each. The partners work together to describe and match each photo with its correct name and purpose. Only after students have completed this task are they allowed to operate any of the equipment.

Managing Talk in Groups

Some instructional tasks require the give-and-take of a slightly larger group of students. Collaborative learning among four students is a bit more active than partner activities, so the noise meter is useful when setting up these tasks. In addition, group tasks tend to be a bit longer than those accomplished in pairs, so a display of elapsed time gives students a way of monitoring their progress and adjusting their rate of work.

Collaborative Posters

A jointly produced final product is useful for group tasks because it gives all the members a shared focus. However, a common problem is that these tasks often fall to one member who does all the writing (and, therefore, much of the thinking). An easy solution is the collaborative poster discussed earlier in this chapter, where each member of the group is given a pen of a different color and all sign their names accordingly.

Ms. Chang uses collaborative posters in her geometry class to get academic discourse and technical vocabulary going. Each group uses theorems to analyze an equation and produce a proof. As Ms. Chang circulates among the groups, she can immediately evaluate the level of participation within the groups and offer extra support to those who do not seem to be sharing their ideas as effectively.

Jigsaw

This instructional routine was developed by Eliot Aronson in the 1970s to support the efforts of a recently desegregated elementary school in Texas. The original intent was to foster cooperation among students who did not associate much with one another, but Aronson (2000) and his graduate students quickly learned of the academic benefits to this approach. Each student in the class has two memberships: a home group and an expert group. Each home group of four members meets to discuss the task and divide the work according to the teacher's directions. For example, a long reading might be divided into sections. After each home group member has his or her task, the groups move to expert groups composed of members with the same task. The expert groups meet to read and discuss their portion of the assignment and practice how they will teach it when they return to their home groups. Once together again, each student teaches his or her portion of the task to fellow home group members and learns about the other sections of the reading.

Jigsaws are also useful for creating discussions. Ms. Armstrong has been reading aloud the book Holes (Sachar, 1998) to her 4th grade students for the last two weeks. After creating home groups of four students, she tells them to decide who will become an expert on each of the following questions:

In what ways does Stanley Yelnats change throughout the story? Is he a better person?

Is Stanley a hero, or is he just a person who makes good choices? What's the difference?

Why do you think the author entitled this book Holes?

Do you think that the Yelnats family's bad luck was due to a curse or something else?

Ms. Armstrong's students joined expert groups to discuss their assigned question at length and debate various ideas raised during the conversations. After 15 minutes, they rejoined their home groups to discuss all four of the questions as each member took a turn facilitating the dialogue.

Managing Listening, Speaking, Reading, Writing, and Thinking

Although the focus of this book is oral discourse in the classroom, we are reminded that oracy and literacy are inextricably intertwined. We use talk to prepare students before they read or write, to enhance comprehension and improve writing, and to encourage reflection and self-monitoring after reading or writing. Perhaps most important, we use talk as a means of engaging students in high levels of critical thinking. As we saw in Chapter 3, opportunities for talk are continuously and seamlessly integrated into opportunities to read, write, and think. Let's take a look inside Ms. Zamorano's 1st grade classroom to see how her students engage in listening, speaking, reading, writing, and thinking.

Language Experience Approach

It's October, and hurricane season is just ending. Ms. Zamorano's students have been learning about weather and how it affects the way people live. While part of the class is working in pairs to write a description of what happens during a hurricane, Ms. Zamorano pulls a small group of English language learners aside for a language experience activity. These are students at fairly early levels of proficiency who mostly speak in short phrases or sentences.

The students begin by looking at a picture of a tree-lined street along the beach. The wind is blowing, the waves are large, one tree lies across the street, and a man and a boy hold hands as they cross the street. Ms. Zamorano asks the students to think for a minute about what they see in the picture, what has just happened, what is happening now, and what they think will happen next. She sets up her questions to elicit vocabulary as well as to teach and practice present, past, and future verb tenses. Together, partners tell each other what they see in the picture. Some students are speaking in isolated words ("Man," "Boy," "Tree"); others string their words together in short phrases ("Tree fall down," "Two people run"). Each student is able to participate at his or her own level of language. Ms. Zamorano draws a circle in the middle of a piece of chart paper and writes the word hurricane in the circle. Then, as the children share what they see in the picture, she writes their words around the circle, grouping the words in categories of things, actions, and feelings. The students practice the pronunciation of the words with Ms. Zamorano, and then they work with their partners to make sentences using the words.

As students share aloud their sentences, Ms. Zamorano writes them on the chart. Although she uses their language, she does model correct grammar, asking students' permission before she writes the revised sentence and then asking students to say each sentence with her. She helps them expand their sentences by asking questions to elicit more detail. Because she wants them to write a narrative, she guides them to group the sentences that fit together and then to sequence them chronologically. On another chart, she rewrites the sentences into the sequence the students have chosen. They read the paragraph aloud and then copy it into their journals. Later, during learning center time, they will reread the paragraphs, cut the paragraphs into sentences and the sentences into words, and then put them back together. The sentences are also used for practice in changing verb tense or adding different sensory words. The paragraphs are collected into a book for students to read during independent reading.

The beauty of the language experience approach is that it uses the students' own language and thinking to expand their language and thinking. Students learn to read and write what they can say and understand. They add to the language they already know. It can be used at any grade level, with students of any proficiency level, as a way to model and guide writing about any topic in any genre or discipline.

Summary

Although the management associated with promoting talk in the classroom can be significant, it is well worth the investment. If students are to benefit from the academic discourse, they must become practiced in engaging in it outside the direct supervision of the teacher. This means that the tasks must be organized and have a clearly stated purpose. In addition, the tasks themselves must be sufficiently interesting so that students will want to invest their time. The collaborative learning that occurs in classrooms rich in talk most closely mirrors the kinds of conversations that will dominate students' postsecondary lives. It seems that it is never too early, or too late, to foster language among learners.

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by Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey and Carol Rothenberg The best way to get a good idea is to get lots of ideas. -Linus Pauling It's a safe bet that the Nobel Prize-winning chemist and peace activist Linus Pauling didn't arrive at all of his good ideas by remaining silent.