Accountable Talk: Providing Feedback on Group Discussions

When your students are getting the hang of accountable talk (and using accountable talk prompts), you can introduce a tool to help monitor how it’s going. Use a big piece of chart paper to draw a diagram:

During a group discussion, draw a representation of the conversation. Connect-the-dots to show the pattern of talk. For example, if the teacher initiates the talk, a student responds to the teacher and then the teacher asks another student a question, the diagram would look like this:

Since you are working to increase student conversation, your goal may be a diagram more like this:

When students get used to using this diagram, you can ask them to self-monitor small group discussions. Just give one member of the group a sticky-note and ask them to track the discussion. It will be “evidence” of their accountable talk.