Engaging All Students in Collaborative Discussions Building comprehension

Engaging All Students in Collaborative Discussions: Building comprehension of narrative and informational texts through listening and speaking Paul Boyd-Batstone, Ph. D. California State University, Long Beach

Common Core Listen and Speaking • Build on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly. • Come to discussions prepared, having read or studied required material; explicitly draw on that preparation and other information known about the topic to explore ideas under discussion. • Follow agreed-upon rules for discussions and carry out assigned roles.

CCSS listening & speaking (cont’) • Pose and respond to specific questions by making comments that contribute to the discussion and elaborate on the remarks of others. • Review the key ideas expressed and draw conclusions in light of information and knowledge gained from the discussions. • Summarize a written text read aloud or information presented in diverse media and formats, including visually, quantitatively, and orally.

Product of a collaborative discusssion • For Narrative texts: Summarize and illustrate the points a speaker makes and discuss your analysis and response to the story. • For Informational texts: Summarize the points a speaker makes and explain how each claim is supported by reasons and evidence, and identify and analyze any logical fallacies.

Helpful Strategies and Unhelpful Practices Helpful Strategies Unhelpful Practices • Beginning to learn new concepts with explicit and concrete vocabulary instruction • Continuing to show visuals and real objects that give clues and images about the instruction • Providing reading previews, including overviews, highlights of difficult passages, and new vocabulary • Falsely assuming that ELLs understand what they read because they can read all of the words aloud and pronounce them correctly • Teaching with misapplied false cognates • Using dictionary definitions exclusively to explain the meanings of words without providing appropriate linguistic supports

Helpful Strategies and Unhelpful Practices (Cont’) Helpful Strategies • Providing a purpose for reading assigned passages • Inviting comparisons by asking, “What is this like? ”, “What is it not like? ”, and “What else is it like? ” • Helping students expand their sentences with alternative adjectives, richer verbs, and transitional phrases Unhelpful Practices • Failing to allow wait time for ELLs to think about their answers before responding • Assigning copying of definitions from word lists • Mocking a student’s misspellings • Evaluating speech only according to conventions (grammar, pronunciation) and neglecting the content of the ideas

Fostering Collaborative Discussions 1. Preparation ü Assign a text for students to read ahead of time. ü Teach key vocabulary and main ideas in the text. ü Organize the class into equal-sized small groups of four to six students. ü Number each member in order (1, 2, 3, 4). ü Tell students they will have one minute each to talk about one aspect of their reading. ü Set a timer for one minute.

2. Initial Discussion • Begin with student #1. • After one minute, follow with student #2 -4. • Repeat the sequence with each student in the group until all students have had a chance to tell about their topic. • All student groups are doing this simultaneously.

3. Class voting • Ask students in each group to vote on the most interesting or compelling story for the group. • Ask each group to give a title to its selected topic. • Write the topic titles on the board—one from each group. • Have the entire class vote on which story they want to hear about.

4. Collaborative Interview • Invite the student who provided the topic to sit in an interviewee’s chair at the front of the room. • Ask the rest of the students to formulate wh- questions to ask about the topic.

Use a Wh- question bank to provide examples of types of questions:

4. Collaborative Interview (cont’) • Moderate the interview. • Model for students how to write down the interviewee’s responses. • Write down the answers to the questions on a large sheet of paper. • Ask students to select key responses to help them understand the text. • Students can then arrange the responses in the form of a story as a homework assignment.

Collaborative Discussion’s 4 parts in review 1. Preparation: Rules, text, grouping, timing 2. Initial Discussion: Everyone gets a 1 minute turn 3. Class Voting: Each group selects a topic, then all vote for a topic of interest 4. Collaborative Interview: invite “wh-” questions

Group Activity 1. Read the classroom “snap shot” about a lesson on erosion. 2. Think of similar lesson you may have taught. What went right? What went wrong? 3. Form a group of 4 people and number off 1 -4 4. In your group, take 1 minute each to share your teaching story. 5. At the end of 4 minutes, select one story from your group and give it a catchy title.

Group Activity (cont’) 1. Record the various “catchy” titles. 2. Vote on a title. 3. Invite the winning title author to be interviewed. 4. Conduct a collaborative interview. 5. Arrange ideas in a logical order.

Latest Book by Paul Boyd-Batstone (2015) Teaching ELLs to Read: Strategies to Meet the Common Core ü K-5 Foundational Reading Standards ü Contextual support for text complexity ü Practical applications for • print concepts, phonological awareness, • phonics and word recognition, • fluency through poetry and music ü CCSS task specific lesson plans http: //www. routledge. com/books/details/9781138017696/

Free Download: White Paper www. catskillcsd. org/documents/Boyd. Batstone_ELLs. pdf “Five Strategies to Help Beginning ELLs Meet the Common Core” by Paul Boyd-Batstone

For More Information Helping English Language Learners Meet the Common Core: Assessment and Instructional Strategies By Paul Boyd-Batstone (2013) Routledge/Eye on education http: //www. taylorandfrancis. com/books/details/97 81596672376/