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.

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. 

Step 1: Plan the outline 
Think through your rubric carefully before you create it with your students. I’ll use a behavior rubric as an example, but they are very useful for ”grading” work also. I’ll make a rubric for partner discussions during reading. What do I want to see/hear? I want to see respectful social behaviors. I want them to take turns talking and be active listeners. I also want to hear thoughtful discussions. I want them to refer to the text for evidence. I want them to prompt each-other to think deeply. OK, now I can organize these ideas into categories.

Step 2: Describe the Behavior
You need to have a pretty good idea about what should go in those boxes before you present this to the students. Try to pinpoint behaviors and evidence in an objective way. If your rubric is very specific, anyone should be able to “grade” the students and reach the same conclusion (including the students themselves). Either you met the criteria or you didn’t. Try to avoid using descriptors like “good” or “bad”. Instead, quantify tangibles (had less than 3 spelling errors).
Your notes might look like this:

Step 3: Create the Rubric with Your Students
Creating a rubric is very cognitively demanding. If your students are new at this, you can help them by showing them examples and “non-examples”. Recruit another teacher or administrator to help you. In our partner discussion example, you would get another teacher to act out a discussion with you in front of the class. First you would have a terrible discussion (the non-example). You would interrupt, not listen, etc. Then, ask the students how you did. Why was it a bad discussion? Then, have a great discussion and have the kids explain why it was better. This will really help them pinpoint specific behaviors (and they think it’s hilarious). Create the rubric on a big piece of chart paper and make sure they can read it from wherever they’ll be sitting.

Step 4: Use the Rubric Everyday
After the students have a partner discussion, ask them to rate themselves. I like using 1,2,3 because they can just hold up their fingers to show you their self-assessment. You’ll say, “How do you think you did today with partner discussions?” and they will show you a score. Choose one group to explain their self-assessment (“We got a 2 because I interrupted one time and we used evidence twice”).  This process takes about 30 seconds.

Step 1: Visualize What you Want
This is often difficult for new teachers. They are not sure what to expect. You know that your students are talking too much when they are supposed to be reading, but can you really expect them to be totally quiet the whole time? You can. You have to know what you want before you can ask your students to change. Here is an example: The students come back from lunch totally wild. They can’t calm down and your first subject after lunch is a real challenge.  Visualize how it should look. The students should come in quietly, in line, and sit down to begin working. Think it through carefully and then move on to step 2. If you’re really not sure what to expect, go observe some of your peers.

Step 2: Create a System
Create a routine for beginning work as soon as they sit down. Maybe they start the math warm-up or take out their writing journals. Everyday it’s the same routine.  Also, stop your students before they enter the classroom. Challenge them to come in and start working in a certain number of seconds. Use your group incentives to reward them.
Here are a couple more examples.
- The kids are losing math supplies. Label them, put them into baggies and ask a student to pass them out and check them back in each day. You won’t waste any time and you can be sure nothing is lost.
- Students have their independent reading books in “book boxes” and you store those all on a bookshelf. But, when it is time for them to get books, there is a bottleneck. Students are waiting to get their books when they should be reading. So, create a book box storage area for each table in different parts of the classroom (table 1 on the bookshelf, table 2 in a basket under the table, etc.). No more bottleneck.

Step 3: Communicate to Students
Call a class meeting to let your students know you’ll be making some changes. Be honest with them. Tell them you’re not happy with the way things are going. Ask them for ideas; tell them about your idea. Make a chart that outlines the new system. Practice. Practice again.  Depending on the situation, you may want to make a rubric.

Step 4: Monitor Progress
Give the class feedback on their progress with the new system: “OK, that was pretty good today. I noticed it only took 20 seconds for everyone to get their books.” If you’ve made a rubric, ask students to rate themselves: “We did great on the timing, but some of us were still talking instead of working. Let’s try to get it perfect tomorrow.”

Making Contact with Parents
Come up with a list of things you want to convey to parents. Keep this handy, because you never know when or how you’ll reach them. Keep it short and easy to understand – they don’t spend all day thinking about school, so you can easily overwhelm them. Here are some ideas:
- best way to contact parents (check phone numbers, address, etc.)
- best way to contact teacher
- homework expectations (how will they know what’s been assigned?)
- behavior system (let them know exactly when/why you’ll contact them)
- academic progress monitoring (let them know exactly when/why you’ll contact them)

How Will I Find Them?
If you only have 5 parents show up to back-to-school night, don’t give up. If you really want to be successful, you’ll have to keep trying and trying…
- Back-to-School Night
- Phone
- Email
- Send a note home
- Home Visit (talk to your administrator before you start these)
- Before school drop-off or after school pick-up
- Ask siblings or other relatives
- Ask your school counselor or nurse to help
- Ask last year’s teacher

The Parent Folder
Give each student a “Parent Folder”. This should stay in the student’s backpack all the time. All information you send home will go in this folder along with all information coming from home. Put a small spiral notebook in the folder where you can write notes and students can record homework assignments (if age appropriate).  Also include the student’s behavior calendar. Make sure you show parents this folder when you meet them (and remind them about it during conferences). Of course some students will lose the folder and others will destroy it, but don’t assume that they can’t be responsible enough to take care of it. They may surprise you.

Setting it Up
1. Begin by practicing the “class meeting formation”. If your students normally sit on the floor facing you, practice getting into a big circle.  When it’s time for a class meeting, you don’t want to waste time with the seating arrangements. I found that the kids love to practice this… time them getting into a circle (it only counts if they can do it silently).
2. Create a chart with the ground-rules. Ask the kids to help you come up with the rules, but they should include: one person talks at a time (you could use an object that the talker holds), respect eachother, accept responsibility, but don’t blame others.
3. Practice, practice, practice. Start with something minor – have a class meeting about getting a class pet. Review the rules and talk about the process. “I like how Carlos respected Sydney by waiting for her to finish”.

When to  Use It
Use the class meeting when you truly want to dialogue with your students. You don’t need to call a class meeting if you’re the only one doing the talking. Here are some examples of good instances for meetings…
- problem spots in the day (ex: we’re having trouble lining up from recess)
- upcoming events (ex: field trip)
- bad (or good) report from substitute
- bully issues (but don’t focus on a particular student)

Additional Classroom Management Resources:
http://www.teachervision.fen.com/classroom-management/interpersonal-skills/4864.html
http://www.nea.org/classmanagement/ifc020919.html
http://www.educationworld.com/a_curr/profdev/profdev012.shtml

Choose a system
How creative are you? I’m not so much, so my system was points on the chalkboard. Each point represented a minute for game time on Friday afternoon. By the way, this was not “free time”.  I had a list of activities to choose from (math games, computer games, etc.).   That is pretty basic, but it worked.  Anything that rewards the group toward some goal (weekly is good).

When  to Reward
Use this system to emphasize what is really important to you.  Of course you’ll give them points if they are all working quietly and you’ll take points away when they are slow lining up. But also think about rewarding them for being a good classroom community. Avoid using the incentive as bait i.e., “If you quiet down, I’ll give you a point”. Instead,  reward behavior when you see it happening.  If the class is doing exceptionally well during independent reading, quietly say, “Nice job” and put a point on the board.  If you see one of your students pick up some trash in the hallway to throw away, say, “Thanks for doing that, Nikki” and put a point on the board. You’re reinforcing a positive community while you modify the group’s behavior.

Here are some examples of instances when you can use your group incentives:
- lining up
- walking in the hall
- independent work (everyone is on task)
- homework (everyone turns it in)
- one student helping another
- group work (productive, respectful discussions)
- positive report from substitute or specials teacher

Some other Resources:
Education World
Dave Wiggins

Colored Flags
I’ll use the flag system as an example, but anything similiar will work. First, think about how you will display and manage the flags. Use a pocket chart and hang it low on the wall so the kids can reach it.  Write each student’s name on a note card and put it in the pocket chart. Next, cut out little squares of green, yellow and red construction paper. Put a set of each color behind each student’s name.  The flags should be visible so that you can glance at the chart and the current flag for every student.

Managing the Chart
Since students will be changing their own flags, the chart itself can become a mess.  Create a classroom job for managing the chart. At the start of each day, a student will reset all the flags to green.

Recording the Results
You’ll be using your chart for all kinds of incentives, so you’ll need to have a long-term record. Each month, give the students a blank calendar. At the end of each day, ask them to color in that day’s results. Make sure all the kids have green, yellow and red crayons easily accessible everyday. Walk by the students who ended up on yellow or red to make sure it’s recorded correctly.

Clue in the Parents
Parents love to have a daily record of how their child is doing. Store the flag calendars in a “Parent Notebook” that goes home with the students everyday. This means you won’t have a copy of all the calendars. Instead, you can keep your own calendar (or a note in your lesson plan book) about and red or yellow flags. It should only be a couple (or none) each day.

Additional Classroom Management Resources:
Dr. Fred Jones