Say Something

I have dozens of stories about my intern experience. I learned a lot from an amazing teacher with a larger-than-life personality. On top of that, the school was in a cultural upheaval and my clinical teacher was leading the charge. My clinical teacher had tons of quips and sayings that stuck with students and teachers that knew him. One of the most memorable things that he ever taught me was, "If they read it, write it, hear it, and say it, chances are they'll know it." It was his way of enforcing repetition and appealing to multiple learning styles. It sounds simple, but there's certainly some truth in there.

That saying has been on my mind this week as I started doing classroom observations. Classrooms look different, but the content that we are teaching and learning is the same. But the smaller groups seem to be inhibiting one of those things that my clinical teacher mentioned. Students don't seem to be talking as much. I'm not sure if it's the masks, the fact that things aren't "normal" yet, or if the smaller groups tend to make students feel more singled out. Maybe it's a combination of all of that. No matter what the cause, we have to figure out how to bring student voice back into the classroom. 

Studies have shown (see here) that student talk is correlated with their achievement. However, it seems that right now we need to be a lot more deliberate with how we get that. Here are a few recommendations to get students talking more:

1. Start each day with a welcoming ritual. Get their thoughts or ideas on literally anything to open the day.

2. Plan consistent opportunities for students to speak. Use this as your opportunity to introduce higher order thinking skills and more open-ended questions.

3. Ask students about their lives beyond the classroom. This builds their relationship with you and the class and breaks the ice to speak later.

4. Ask for student feedback - and use it. This validates that what they say is important and will encourage more talking later.

Sharing ideas and thoughts is going to be essential to getting small group instruction to work and that means that we have to get students talking. Who knows, they may have something important to say if we do.