Build Academic Language in Small Groups

Activity: Facilitate small group discussions and encourage engagement. It’s important to take advantage of synchronous time together to build academic language practice, especially for English learners.

1. Listen to a story together, and then ask students to write a two sentence summary of the story.
2. Using the Stronger and Clearer strategy, put students into pairs for a “turn-and-talk” and ask them to discuss their summaries with their partner. 
3. Put students into 1-2 more "turn-and-talk's" to further discuss their summary, allowing students to strengthen their written summary and clarify their ideas.
4. Reconvene as a whole group to review and debrief the activity. 

Learning Objectives: EL-focused instruction, speaking & listening practice, reading & writing practice, student engagement, formative assessment

Content Suggestions: Our current events offer a wide variety of engaging topics. New stories are published every school week!

Learning Mode: Synchronous

Total Time: 30-45 minutes 

Learn More: Explore more techniques from Jeff Zwiers here. Hear how one teacher used breakout rooms to facilitate "turn-and-talk's" during remote learning. Her ideas can be easily translated back to in-person learning!