Using Pair and Group Work to Develop ELLs’ Oral Language Skills
In our last post, we shared information about the new Teaching Channel ELL series based on Bookish Conversations (2011) past Jeff Zwiers and Marie Crawford featuring related classroom videos developed in partnership with the Oakland Unified Schoolhouse District. This week nosotros'd like to delve deeper into these resource and provide strategies for building the oral language skills of ELLs across content areas that are framed around four practices.
Most teachers understand that pair and grouping work provide excellent opportunities for ELLs' oral language development because each student has more than time to talk than in a large group give-and-take, and students often feel more than comfortable sharing their ideas in a small grouping environment. However, in society to build on the skills described in the CCSS, it may be necessary to re-envision pair and group work and provide additional supports for ELLs. ELLs may find group work challenging if they do not understand their expected role in the chore they are working on, or if they do not feel confident in using the language required for the task.
In this blog post nosotros will first examine two speaking and listening standards that can exist used to help frame grouping work. Adjacent, nosotros will highlight 4 student practices based on recommendations from Zwiers & Crawford (2011) and the practices demonstrated in the Teaching Channel classroom video clips. These iv student practices will foster oral language development and back up ELLs in meeting the standards. For each of the practices, we will provide an explanation and share some Educational activity Channel video clips that show the practices in action.
Iv Practices for Fostering ELLs' Oral Language Development
These four practices are:
- Coming to the discussion prepared
- Using appropriate body language for discussions
- Participating by taking turns
- Making connections to what others have said
Guiding Common Cadre State Standards
First, allow's take a look at two standards that are part of the Speaking and Listening Anchor Standards for K-12 that are most relevant for our purpose.
| Comprehension and Collaboration | Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas |
|---|---|
| CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.SL.ane Prepare for and participate finer in a range of conversations and collaborations with diverse partners, building on others' ideas and expressing their ain clearly and persuasively. | CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.CCRA.SL.4 Present data, findings, and supporting evidence such that listeners can follow the line of reasoning and the organisation, development, and style are appropriate to job, purpose, and audience. |
Co-ordinate to the standards listed above, all students (including ELLs) will demand practice in holding discussions with varied partners, learning to effectively express their ideas with supporting prove, and learning to build on the ideas of other students. Teachers tin help ELLs run across those standards with the following practices.
Come to the discussion prepared
As we discussed in our Socratic Circles blog mail, it is important for students to accept sufficient preparation in the content they will be discussing. To view a model of means teachers can aid students gear up and engage in academic discussions through small group work, take a look at the video of Ms. Groves' class discussion of Siddhartha'south Journey. In the video, Ms. Groves described having students do several shut reading of the Siddhartha'due south text and answer text-dependent questions that are open up-concluded, are not simply limited to questions with i right response, and require students to answer using evidence from the text. Students then shared their responses to the text-dependent questions in small groups.
In making recommendations for the types of questions and prompts teachers can develop to help students plan for think-pair-share activities, Zwiers (2010) makes some suggestions in the table beneath. Teachers can provide these types of prompts in a graphic organizer or a journal prompt prior to classroom discussions. It is of import to note that these types of questions and prompts can exist used across content areas and academic conversations should not exist express only English language arts.
Types of Questions and Examples
| Create Questions That…; | Examples |
|---|---|
| Focus students on cardinal content concepts. |
|
| Allow for divergent and personalized responses, every bit long as they connect back to show in the text. |
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| Emphasize i or more thinking skills being developed in the lesson and unit. Thinking skills that come from standards include: questioning, interpreting, classifying, persuading, evaluating, analyzing, comparing, and synthesizing. |
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| Deepen understandings and focus students back to the essential standards of the text, lesson, and unit. |
|
Adapted from: ALDNetwork.org (2013). Think pair share tips. Retrieved from http://www.jeffzwiers.org
In structuring group and pair discussions, it is helpful for ELLs to accept their written ideas or notes for reference. However, information technology is also important to aid students transition to being able to speak without the utilize of notes. Every bit you saw in the video of Ms. Groves' course, she suggested that her students non always read from their notes. Similarly, this video prune of Ms. Brewer's class shows how gummy notes tin can exist used to support pupil discussion. Sticky notes will assistance students concur on to their ideas without allowing them to rely besides heavily on written notes in a discussion.
Use appropriate trunk language for discussions
It is important that students acquire the body language associated with academic discussions. Zwiers and Crawford (2011) identify behaviors that are valued in school:
- Advisable center contact (which tin mean non constantly staring at the other person merely also not always looking downwards, abroad, or past the other person)
- Facing each other with the unabridged body
- Leaning toward the partner
- Showing understanding through caput nodding
- Advisable gesturing (not rolling eyes, sighing, or folding arms)
ELLs may need some straight didactics in what is considered culturally appropriate body linguistic communication for discussions in U.South. classrooms. All the while, teachers of ELLs should recognize and respect how ELLs might bear witness respect and engage in discussions in their cultures. This video of Ms. Nguyen's 6th course less provides an example of a participation protocol that demonstrates one way to teach students how to accordingly apply body linguistic communication to engage in a word. She includes the post-obit criteria in her class' participation protocol: expect at your partner, lean towards your partner, lower your voice, listen attentively, and utilize show and examples. Equally students are having discussions, she uses a checklist to monitor how well they are meeting these criteria.
Participate past taking turns
It is of import for students to have turns speaking. In pairs, it is likely that plow taking will occur naturally. However, in a pocket-size or large group, a tool such every bit a talking rock or talking stick (a stone or a stick that students hold to "give them the floor" to talk) tin encourage all members of the group to take function in the word. Students tin laissez passer the talking stone or talking stick around in a circle, and the student who has the rock or stick tin take the opportunity to say something or laissez passer. The rock or stick tin can also exist placed in the middle of the group and students can accept information technology as they accept something to say. In the video of Ms. Groves' form, we saw students pass effectually a talking rock as a way to support students taking turns and to encourage all members of the grouping to participate.
An additional way to encourage turn taking is to teach and model strategies for inviting someone into the conversation (e.1000., Manuel, what do yous predict the daughter in the story will do side by side?)
Make connections to what others take said
Not only do students need to be able to share their ain opinions by using evidence from texts or content fabric being studied, they likewise need to interact with the ideas of others. Modeling and providing ELs with key phrases can support them in their efforts to build on the ideas of others.
More specifically, Talk moves are the soapbox behaviors that students need to practise in order to effectively engage in a discussion. Such behaviors include: restating what was said, agreeing and disagreeing, request clarifying questions, adding to or piggybacking on what someone has said, and making connections between ideas.
In this video prune, the students in Ms. Simpson'south class practise using talk moves in a whole group discussion during a math lesson. Students will need exercise with talk moves earlier they are able to use them on their own in pocket-sized groups or pairs.
In the video of Ms. Groves classroom, nosotros saw that she had judgement stems that were hands accessible to support students' utilise of talk moves, and when monitoring the small groups she referred students back to these stems. Another thought for using talk moves would be for each student to have a handout or index card with sentence stems that can be used that students could have in front of them during discussions. The table below provides some possible judgement stems for specific types of talk moves.
Talk Moves Sentence Stems
| Restating |
|
| Agreeing |
|
| Disagreeing |
|
| Asking a clarifying question |
|
| Adding to an idea |
|
| Making connections betwixt ideas |
|
Zwiers and Crawford (2011) likewise suggest chat mini-lessons that provide teachers opportunities to introduce a conversation skill to students and and then have them practice it in a relatively short time period. Examples of possible mini lessons could include request each other for supporting examples, building on a partner'southward idea, and paraphrasing conversations themes. Mini lessons should include opportunities to clarify strong chat skills, teacher or student modeling, some type of scaffolded support (due east.chiliad., graphic organizers, sentence stems), and opportunities to exercise and build contained skills.
Summary
We have shared a lot of information with you in this blog post! To help you keep information technology all straight, the post-obit table provides a summary of the four educatee practices that support ELLs' participation in pair and small-scale group work. Nosotros also define each practice and share the accompanying Teaching Channel videos that show you what the practise looks similar in action. Nearly of the videos are the same as were mentioned above. However, there are likewise a couple of additional videos added that model the pupil practices.
Student Oral Language Practice, Definition of Practice, and Video Examples of Practice
| Practice for Fostering ELLs' Oral Language Development | Definition of Practice | Video Examples of Practice |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Come to the discussion prepared | Students are able to finer prepare for a minor group discussion or activeness past thinking independently nigh the text or material that volition exist discussed and the key ideas that they want to contribute. They too have text-based or content-based evidence to support their ideas and the academic linguistic communication necessary for the task. |
|
| 2. Use appropriate torso language for discussions | Students understand and are able to use torso linguistic communication associated with academic discussions including facing each other, making eye contact, and leaning towards partner or group members, and nodding and gesturing to betoken date. |
|
| 3. Participate past taking turns | Students are able both to listen when others are speaking and regularly contribute to the discussion in an effective manner. |
|
| 4. Make connections to what others have said | Students are able to collaborate with others in their group by agreeing and disagreeing with what was said, asking clarifying questions, restating what was said, and making connections betwixt ideas. |
|
More Resources on Edifice ELLs' Oral Linguistic communication
For boosted resources and videos on this topic, have a expect at the following:
- Jeff Zwiers' Academic Language and Literacy website
- Jeff Zwiers article on Key Strategies for Developing Oral Language on the Teaching Channel
- Zwiers & Crawford'southward book Academic Conversations: Classroom Talk that Fosters Critical Thinking and Content Understandings
- Carrie Kamm's commodity on Building Common Core Skills: Beyond "Turn and Talk" on the Teaching Channel
- Lily Jones' blog Video Playlist: Engaging ELLs in Academic Conversations on the Education Aqueduct
- Nicole Knight's blog Why are Bookish Discussions And then Important for our ELLs? on the Teaching Channel
We promise these suggestions and supporting video clips give you lot some new ideas for group work in your classroom. Let u.s.a. know what works well for your class!
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