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.

This is a simple template for progress monitoring. It’s an excel file, so you can enter the specific categories according to grade and standard. I included a couple of examples. Download the Progress Report here. It looks like this:

Show, Don’t Tell
You probably won’t get great results if you tell a group of kindergartners to go to their desks and write about a memory. Instead of telling them what to do, you’ll have to show them each step.  Each time you teach them a technique or strategy, show them how to use it. Walk them through the entire process and encourage participation. You’ll need a big standing easel and chart paper so they can all see your work.

Choosing a Shared Experience
If you’re working on memoirs (writing about things that have happened in their lives) and you model “My Vacation in Florida”, you might loose them at airplane.  Instead, choose events that you do together. Of course you can write about big events like field trips, assemblies and field day. But you can also write about smaller events that happen everyday like reading games, science projects and library visits.

Model Your Thinking
Maybe you collected rocks as a science activity and you chose to model writing about that experience. First, think out loud: “OK, I think I’ll write about finding my rock yesterday. That was fun. What do I need to do first?” Kids will help you think it through: “Put your name on your paper!” Think out loud through the entire process. “I remember when I found my rock. I was over by the slide. I’m going to write about that. My first sentence will be, ‘I ran out the door’. I know how to write ‘I’. Next I’ll write ‘ran’.”

Reinforce Strategies
Choose a couple of strategies to reinforce during the modeling. If you have a word wall, for example, use it. If the students have alphabet charts on their desks, you should have one handy also. You might say, “Let’s see… ‘ran’. I’m going to look on my alphabet chart for the rrrrr sound. Here it is; just like ‘rocket’. R!”

Complete the Process
If your writing project will take more than one day, it might be tempting to tell the students, “OK, today you’ll finish your story from yesterday. Go ahead and get to work.” You’ll probably need to show them how to do this. Take out your model. Re-read it. Notice and correct a mistake. Think out loud about how to pick up where you left off. In other words, show them each step through completion.

Create an Audience
When students write in their journals, the writing is just for them (and you) to read. When it’s time to select a piece to publish (revise, edit and create a finished product), construct an audience. Tell students when they begin working on their selections that there will be a publishing celebration during which they will read their work aloud. Invite parents, other teachers and the principal.  Of course, this serves to build community and involve parents. But it is also important for the writing process itself. It gives them another reason to do their very best work.

Set the Mood
Count down the days until the party. Make invitations and decorations; plan to have snacks for the guests. Have a plan for how you will greet your guests and where they will sit. In other words, make it a big deal. Decorate the “stage” for the presenters.  If you have access to a video camera, record the presentations and show it to the class later.

Define the Writing Cycle
Setting a date for a publishing celebration defines an absolute ending point to the editing process. Some kids don’t need this; they can complete the process easily. Other students have trouble getting through the drafting and the editing. These kids tend to have many “almost finished” drafts.  The party pushes them to finish a piece so they can participate. If your students are very independent in their writing, and are all in different stages of the editing process, they can choose a favorite piece to read at the celebration.

Stage Fright
Even the most outgoing kids can get nervous reading in front of an audience. You’ll want to practice this skill by letting them read in front of the class several times before the party. Encourage them to give it a try, but don’t ever force someone to present if they are too nervous. If a student decides to back out at the last moment, ask if they would like you to read the piece aloud instead.

Display the Published Pieces
Create a special area in your classroom to display the completed pieces. Allow students to check them out, just like the other books. Plan to have publishing parties at the end of each unit of study (poetry, non-fiction, etc). Each published piece can then be added to the student’s writing portfolio.

This post is about physical configurations that promote engaging, learning-based talk in your classroom. Also see posts about accountable talk prompts and questioning strategies. 

Setting up Accountable Talk
Kids are used to talking to a partner (think-pair-share), but you can also try some different grouping configurations.  Start by introducing the concept in a mini-lesson. Make a chart with the different styles you show them and practice, practice, practice. Kids love this; you can time them moving from one configuration to another. When you practice talking, encourage them to extend their conversations by asking their partner “why?”.  When they get stuck, tell them to refer to the accountable talk prompts. Listen in to different conversations so you can highlight great accountable talk.  Create a rubric in order to give students feedback about the quality of their discussions. Also try using a diagram to track discussion.

Home Base
When you begin a mini-lesson, expect all the students to sit on the floor facing you. If you run into trouble with kids sitting too far away, or not wanting to sit next to each-other, just assign seats on the floor and be finished with that discussion.  When you introduce another arrangement, practice moving to and from “home base” - quietly and quickly.

Partners
Students should sit next to their “talk-partner” everyday.  Encourage them to sit knee-to-knee, look one another in the eye and listen attentively. When you practice partner talk, cue students to take turns talking. For example, you read a passage aloud and say, “Now turn and talk to your partner about Charlie’s big decision.” After a few minutes say, “Now make sure your partner has a chance to talk.” Use partner talk when you want every student to express their opinion… and be accountable for the intended learning.

Groups of Four
Two partner groups can join forces for a group of four. Don’t use this configuration if you expect each student to thoroughly justify an opinion. Instead, you can use it to “take a poll” in which students contribute and briefly explain. Also, when you feel very comfortable with your students’ ability to have quality discussions you can let them have free-form talk in groups of four.

Whole Group Circle
Use the group circle when you have an opportunity to build community through accountable talk. Maybe you read a book about civil rights and you want to discuss how it relates to issues in your classroom. Students are often shy in this configuration and might rely on you to get keep the conversation going. Once they get more comfortable, try to step back and let them take over. 

“Accountable talk” is student conversation centered on learning.  You can teach students to have conversations about text, to respond to each-other and to articulate their thinking.

Make a chart with a menu of conversation prompts.  Make sure you model each one when you add it to the chart. When your chart is complete, hang it on the wall so that students can refer to it.  You can also make a rubric in order to evaluate student participation - and allow students to rate themselves after discussions.

Accountable Talk Prompts
- I wonder why…
- I have a question about…
- I agree with…
- I disagre with…
- That reminds me of…
- I don’t understand…
- I predict…
- I figured out…
- I liked/disliked….

You can think of reading comprehension in two parts: decoding - recognizing/sounding out words and comprehension- understanding the meaning of the text.  One does not precede the other; kids can understand text even when they can’t decode every word.  Conversely, even when they are able to read every word correctly, they still may not comprehend the story. Fluent readers use many strategies to make sense of what they are reading, and they do it automatically. We can help beginning readers by isolating these strategies and practicing them. When children have these strategies in their reading repertoire, they can start to combine them automatically and become more fluent readers.

Decoding Strategies:
Sample sentence: The bear climbed to the top of the tree to find the fruit.
-What is the beginning sound? C-C-Cl. The bear cl-cl-cl…
-Check the picture. What is the bear doing?
-Skip it and go back (context clues). The bear…. to the top of the tree. What did he do?
-Similar words. Does this look like another word you know?
-Sound it out. Cover up part of the word to isolate one sound at a time. Cl-cl-cl-iiiiii-mmmmm-ddddd

**A note about working on decoding strategies: Reading words should never be isolated from comprehension. Reading is meaning. If you’re struggling through each word and not discussing the book, you might end up disliking the process. Try to find books that are slightly challenging, but enjoyable. Make sure you incorporate discussion every time.

Comprehension Strategies:
-Make connections: Relate what happens in the book to your own life, or in another book.
-Predict: What do you think is going to happen next?
-Make inferences: Why do you think she was so angry?
-Question/Wonder: I wonder why he did that…. What’s the matter with the baby?
-Visualize: What picture do you see in your head when I read this part?
-Text Structure: Point out titles/headings/picture captions.

Comprehension strategies based on Making Meaning reading program.

What do you want to hear from the students?
This seems like a simple question, but it actually takes some careful consideration. Do you want students to answer comprehension questions or do you want them to have authentic discussion? Often, teachers lead a “discussion group” and the only person talking is the teacher. They ask simple yes/no or short answer right-or-wrong questions.  This is very comfortable for teachers because they control the pace and direction of the discussion.  If you want to encourage authentic student-generated discussion, you might have to step outside of your comfort zone.

Also see posts about accountable talk discussion prompts and grouping configurations.

The Questioning Pyramid
You can think of discussion prompts as a pyramid - very broad, open-ended questions at the bottom and increasingly specific questions as you move up.

Scaffolding Questions
Questions at the base of the pyramid require more thought and lend themselves to student-directed discussion. They are also much more difficult and may result in blank stares and awkward silences. If students are not used to answering such broad questions, you can scaffold up the pyramid. Always start with the most broad, then move toward more specifics if the students get stuck. Your can always lead them back to the base as the discussion gets going.

Some questions to consider while planning lessons:

What?

1. What is the intended learning? What are the skills, concepts, habits of mind being developed?
2. To what standard(s) is the lesson content connected?
3. What difficulties, misunderstandings, or misconceptions might students have about this content?
4. What theories of teaching and learning support this lesson design?

 How? 

5. How will the teacher model/explain clear expectations for the students’ learning?
6. How will each activity promote rigorous thinking?
7. How will students be grouped for learning? How is the grouping related to the lesson content?
8. How will accountable student talk and collaboration be encouraged in an atmosphere of mutual respect?
9. How will students make public their thinking and learning?
10. How will assistance be provided to individual students (struggling students as well as those needing an extra challenge)?
11. How will student learning be assessed by the teacher and by the students themselves?
12. How will student accomplishment be recognized?
13. How will the teacher do things differently the next time? How will instruction proceed form here?

 Why? 

14. Why is the lesson content appropriate to the students’ learning needs and prior knowledge?
15. Why are these instructional strategies/learning activities appropriate to the lesson/goals?

 Questions derived from The Institute for Learning’s Content-Focused Coaching model.

Reciprocal reading is a strategy for small group comprehension work. It’s great for your more independent, advanced readers. They need to be familiar with the strategies summarizing, questioning, clarifying and predicting. I used this strategy often with fifth graders and they loved it.  Give each student this guide sheet.

Here is a summary from ReadingQuestStrategies.org:

What Is Reciprocal Teaching?
The creation of Palinscar and Brown, Reciprocal Teaching is in some ways a compilation of four comprehension strategies:

You might also consider implementing reciprocal teaching the way Donna Dyer of the North West Regional Education Service Agency in North Carolina recommends. Here’s one way she suggests you use reciprocal teaching: