Workshop NexGen Science

Unit!6,!Step!5!(Gotta;Have!Explanation!Checklists!and!Summary!Tables)! 99 ! \" \" We\"have\"found\"that\"the\"best\"way\"to\"keep\"a\"record\"of\"activity\"and\"ideas\"is\"to\"create\"a\"table\"with\" four\"columns—1)\"Activities\"we\"did,\"2)\"Patterns\"or\"observations,\"what\"happened?,\"3)\"What\"do\" you\"think\"caused\"these\"patterns\"or\"observations?,\"4)\"How\"do\"these\"patterns\"help\"us\"think\"about\" the\"essential\"question\"or\"puzzling\"phenomenon?\"As\"you\"can\"see\"in\"the\"figures\"included\"here,\" there\"are\"many\"variations\"created\"by\"our\"teachers.\"They\"are\"all\"adaptations\"that\"are\"useful\"for\" their\"particular\"classroom\"needs.\"\" \" The\"table\"is\"placed\"on\"a\"wall\"in\"the\"classroom\"and\"it\"remains\"up\"throughout\"the\"unit.\"After\"each\" round\"of\"reading\"and\"activity,\"students\"are\"in\"charge\"of\"discussing\"how\"the\"activity\"helps\"them\" think\"about\"the\"phenomenon,\"and\"filling\"in\"one\"complete\"row.\"As\"the\"unit\"progresses,\"more\"and\" more\"rows\"get\"filled\"in\"and,\"ideally,\"students\"start\"to\"piece\"together\"a\"more\"coherent\"and\" complete\"explanation\"by\"looking\"“down”\"the\"fourth\"column.\" \" Some\"teachers\"argue\"that\"they\"don't\"have\"enough\"wall\"space\"to\"keep\"summary\"tables\"for\"every\" class\"period,\"however\"there\"are\"always\"ways\"around\"this\"by\"using\"a\"flip\"chart\"or\"simply\"making\" space\"on\"your\"walls.\"Teachers\"often\"have\"commercial\"posters\"up\"that\"are\"not\"really\"helpful\"in\" supporting\"students'\"learning\"(think\"about\"taking\"them\"down)—the\"summary\"table\"is\"far\"more\" powerful\"for\"helping\"students\"reason\"with\"evidence.\"\" ! \" ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! 3! !

Unit!6,!Step!5!(Gotta;Have!Explanation!Checklists!and!Summary!Tables)! ! ! ! Helpful!advice!from!our!teacher!colleagues!who!have!successfully!used!!Summary!Tables:! •\"Don't\"put\"too\"many\"columns\"into\"your\"summary\"table,\"and\"don't\"have\"more\"than\"five\"rows.\"\" •\"The\"students\"should\"be\"in\"charge\"of\"negotiating\"what\"goes\"in\"each\"column\"after\"a\"reading\"or\" activity.\"At\"the\"elementary\"level\"the\"teacher\"would\"take\"more\"responsibility\"for\"crafting\"the\" sentences.\"\" •\"Don't\"wait\"until\"the\"end\"of\"a\"unit\"to\"fill\"in\"the\"rows\"(we've\"seen\"this\"happen),\"it\"is\"unhelpful\" and\"confusing\"for\"students.\"Fill\"in\"each\"row\"immediately\"after\"each\"activity.\"\" •\"Help\"students\"make\"sense\"of\"what\"they've\"learned\"from\"each\"activity.\"There\"has\"to\"be\"time\" allocated\"to\"this\"at\"the\"end\"of\"the\"class\"period\"and\"perhaps\"also\"at\"the\"start\"of\"the\"following\" class\"period.\"\" •\"When\"students\"are\"drawing\"and\"writing\"their\"final\"explanatory\"model,\"have\"them\"use\"one\"or\" two\"rows\"on\"the\"summary\"table\"to\"express\"a\"type\"of\"evidence\"that\"they\"are\"using\"to\"support\" part\"of\"that\"explanation.\"Especially\"early\"in\"the\"year,\"you\"don’t\"want\"students\"to\"try\"to\"use\"the\" whole\"summary\"table\"and\"all\"the\"evidence\"expressed\"within\"it\"to\"support\"their\"explanations.\"\" \" \" *\"\"\"*\"\"*\"\"*\"\"*\"\"*\"\"*\" \" \" \" 4! 100 !







ARTICLES Talk Science Primer (Unit 3) Establishing Norms … (Unit 4) Moving Beyond “Knowing”… (Unit 6) Why Ask Why? (Unit 6) 101













































Establishing Norms: Laying the Foundations for Academically Productive Talk (Examples from science teaching and learning) Sarah Michaels (Clark University) & Cathy O’Connor (Boston University) 1. Why do we need to lay a foundation? Mrs. Jennings is working on a unit on fast plants with her 6th graders. Two different conditions have been set up, in one case varying the amount of light the plants receive, and in the other case the kind of plant food added to the water the plants get. The students have been charting the growth of the 40 plants and are now comparing the results of their graphs of the height of the plants on day 19. Two groups have presented their findings. They have graphed their results (using the same data) quite differently and all of the students have been asked to examine both graphs carefully, ask questions of the two groups, and decide if the charts are both presenting the same data or not, and if they are, what the differences are between the charts in terms of what they make visible. Mrs. J: OK, this is really interesting. Juan is saying, if I’m understanding you correctly, that the two charts cannot be Juan: equivalent, are not representing the same data points, because they look so different. Is that what you were Mrs. J: saying, Juan? Jeanette: Yeah, because one [pointing to the graph on the right] shows the most plants looking the tallest in the center, with the shortest plants on one end and the tallest plants on the other end. How can the tallest plants be both in the center and on the end? Jeanette? Well I sort of disagree, because the shape, I mean the shape of the graph doesn’t tell you the height, in both graphs. I

2 mean … in the curved graph [pointing to the right], the highest point is showing you how many plants reached that height. (pause) I mean it’s the number of plants, not the height. Um, just because it’s high, doesn’t mean it’s tall. But on the other graph, it’s just plotting each plant by height, so tall means tall. But on the other, um… high doesn’t mean high … Jason: (under his breath but loud enough for many students to hear, including Jeanette): Girl, you talk so slow, I’m beginning to think high does mean high! Jeanette: Oh never mind. Mrs. J: No, no go on. You’re saying something really important and helpful to this discussion. Go on. Take your time. [long pause] You were saying that on the two graphs, height means something different. Jeanette: Um, never mind. (Jeanette doesn’t speak again during the entire lesson.) What is happening here? Jeanette began to express her ideas, challenging the position of one of her classmates, and emphasizing the importance of understanding what height (along the Y-axis) is representing (either inches or number of plants). Her ideas were complex and not particularly well formulated. A classmate — perhaps uncomfortable about Jeanette’s fumbling, perhaps impatient, perhaps just mean – makes a cutting remark. We see that Jeanette immediately backs off and even with prodding and kind reassurance from the teacher, refuses to participate again during the lesson. Interactions like this are the reason that teachers must first establish safe and respectful environments for talk. Academically productive talk in any content domain simply cannot proceed if these foundations are not in place. Why not? Because many students will not take risks and go public with complex ideas if they are afraid that they will be ridiculed. If treated disrespectfully, even in seemingly playful or harmless ways, many students will just “opt out” of the conversation as Jeanette did. When this happens, everyone loses out – Jeanette as well as her classmates. The classroom community (teacher and students) do not get the benefit of her ideas. Her ideas will not be heard, challenged, built upon and expanded. If we are serious about cultivating complex thinking and rigorous arguments on the part of students, we have to make the classroom a place where students can think out loud – doing what some researchers have called “first draft talk” or “exploratory talk.” This talk is sometimes halting, with pauses, repetitions, hesitations, and false starts. It is often hard to follow. The ideas may also be flawed in some respects. But the point is for students to have an opportunity to clarify their ideas and for others to listen hard and try to build upon them, and improve them.

3 It’s obvious that derisive comments like the one made by Jason are not polite. But we want to emphasize here that much more is at stake than politeness. Working hard to create a climate of respect among students is not just about valuing politeness as an end in itself. Rather, it is a necessary condition if students are to go beyond the obvious, trying out complex ideas and thinking on their feet before their ideas are fully developed and coherent. Some students would not be bothered by Jason’s disrespectful comment. Some students are confident in their ability to explain complex ideas and will forge ahead regardless of what their peers say. But many others would shut down and stop trying to participate. If this happens, we unintentionally are limiting access to the conversation to those students who were confident and accomplished at doing this kind of talk at the outset. Over time, some students dominate the conversation and others are silenced. The issue of respect is thus very much an issue of access and opportunity to participate in and learn from rigorous talk. It is about creating the opportunity to enter into productive conversations for all students. This text is divided into four sections. Section 2 is about introducing the practices that will establish safe and respectful environments for talk. Section 3 discusses how these new talk norms must be integrated with academic content from the beginning. Section 4 is about establishing norms for equitable participation, so that all students have access to the conversation. Finally, Section 5 addresses problems that arise and offers advice on troubleshooting. It also suggest ways that teachers can assess their own classroom situation and identify likely problems so that they can anticipate them and address them before they escalate into big problems. 2. Introducing norms and ground rules Negotiating clear expectations across the grade levels How do teachers succeed in creating a classroom culture that supports productive talk and reasoning? Not everyone’s classroom looks the same. Successful teachers respond to the unique needs of their classes and schools, and establish norms and ground rules in a wide variety of ways. However, all successful classrooms share two common elements: 1) teachers convey clear expectations and 2) students share an understanding about why these rules are important. Teachers who are successful thus work hard to make the rules for talk explicit and public. But beyond establishing the rules (and charting them or handing them out to students), they take ample time to make sure that the students themselves can articulate what the rules mean, getting the students themselves to explain why these are reasonable, good rules for everyone. What does this look like in practice? Some teachers give a speech of some sort – laying out the rules and justifying them. Other teachers opt to create a class chart together, allowing students to propose rules and discuss among themselves which ones they want and why. Some teachers develop a handout of rules, pass them out to the students and go over them, asking the students to provide reasons that these rules are important. In this

4 section, we provide a number of different examples showing different approaches teachers have taken. In each case, you will see that great care is taken to make the norms clear, public, and collectively “owned.” What will work best for a particular teacher will likely depend on a number of things: the age of the students, their previous experiences with talk (from earlier grades), the time of the year (i.e., how socialized the students already are to certain ways of talking), and the general climate of the classroom (i.e., how respectful the students normally are in discussions with one another). Teachers need to think carefully about their own group or groups of students. Questions and suggestions teachers might consider: Do you want your students to participate in generating the rules? If you teach a number of sections of the same class, do you want to create a common list so that each group is held to the same standards? In some cases, it is helpful to meet with colleagues and talk about establishing a shared set of ground rules for all students at that grade level or even across the entire school so that students encounter the same expectations throughout the day and from teacher to teacher. In these cases, it is important to take the time to make these “common rules” clear and applicable to your particular situation. As with most things, there are trade-offs with either option—having the rules come from the teacher or from the students. Teacher-generated rules may create more overall consistency for students from class to class, and be more quickly internalized by students who move around from class to class (in middle and high school). Student-generated rules may create more of a sense of involvement, buy-in, and agency on the part of the students in creating a positive classroom culture for talk. Specific suggestions for ways to start Teachers who have used classroom discussions successfully in science have found specific ways to introduce the norms to their own students, taking into account the ages and backgrounds of their students.1 For young children (pre-K through 2nd grade) The following outline offers suggestions for first introducing talk moves to your students in a whole-class discussion. Of course you can adapt these to the needs and backgrounds of your students. •Thinking together about science [or any domain] can help us all understand science better. •Each person's thinking is different and unique, and we can all learn from one another. •We can think together by talking together about our thinking. •What does it take for us to understand another person's thinking? 1 These examples are adapted from the book, Classroom Discussions: Using Math Talk to Help Students Learn, Grades 1-6 (Chapin, et al. 2009). Although that book was written with mathematics instruction as the focus, the ideas and strategies can be applied to all subject areas.

5 —We have to be able to hear what they say. —We have to listen carefully and try to understand. —We have to ask questions when we don't understand. —We have to take turns so everybody who wants a chance gets one. With young children, it's a good idea to start with the talk move of asking a student to repeat what another student has said in his or her own words. Tell students before you begin that you will be asking them to repeat what they have heard. You can explain to students that this will help everyone to make sure that they have heard what the speaker has said, and that they have understood it. It's a good idea to ask several students in a row to repeat what the same speaker has said. This lets them know that each student's listening and speaking are important. It lets children know that they are responsible for listening carefully to every speaker. It’s also a good idea to ask young children to support their own reasoning from early on. When a student provides an answer, begin with a gentle follow-up: \"So can you tell us about your reasoning?\" Or: \"Can you tell us why you think that's the answer?\" This will soon lead even young children to begin talking about their reasoning. You can use the technique of \"revoicing\" to make sure that other children can hear and begin to understand what the speaker is saying: “So, let me see if I’ve got your idea right. Are you saying…?” [O]ne very useful talk move is asking students whether they agree or disagree with another student's idea or claim. Teachers of very young children may want to introduce this aspect of the practice only after the children are comfortable talking about their own thinking and listening to others. However, this move is certainly possible for very young children. For grades 3 [and up] Here is a more elaborate outline of an introduction to productive classroom talk, more suitable for older students. However, keep in mind that students in this age range vary greatly in their ability to take in complex explanations for instructional practices. Rely on your own judgment in using and sequencing these suggestions. Remember to be explicit in your explanations and leave time for discussion and clarification of this important first step. • Thinking together about science can help us all understand science better. Difficult problems often call for more than one person’s input, in posing questions, in collecting and organizing data, evaluating evidence, developing theories. Furthermore, we can all learn new ways of thinking about science from listening to how others think. And finally, talking through our thinking can help us clarify our own thoughts. If we try to communicate clearly, our thinking may get better as a result of our efforts.

6 • Thinking usually seems to go on inside one person's head. However, we can share our thinking by talking together about our ideas. • What does it take for us to understand another person's thinking? — We have to be able to hear the speaker. Everyone has a right to be heard. — Everyone has an obligation to listen and to try to understand what the speaker is saying. — We are obligated to ask questions when we don't understand. — The speaker has an obligation to try hard to be clear. — Everyone has a right to participate. How can we make sure that everyone has a chance to participate? [Here you might discuss your current methods of taking turns and ask your students to make suggestions.] What might keep people from participating? [Here a discussion of how people feel when others make fun of their thinking is a good idea. From this discussion you can derive your classroom's norms for courteous and respectful discourse, including agreements about what sanctions will be brought to bear on those who violate the norms.] Some teachers have used such a discussion as an occasion to create a wall chart codifying the norms of respectful discourse and full participation. You can integrate your own concerns in this discussion, and of course the wall chart can be reviewed and changed as time goes on. … With older students, when asking students to explain their own reasoning, use the move of asking students to repeat what someone else said. Introducing the \"agree or disagree\" move may best be introduced a bit later, depending upon your students' facility with this kind of interaction. … When you introduce this move, it may be a good idea to emphasize the connection between academic content and respectful talk. For example, when you ask students to agree or disagree with what another student said, it's helpful to emphasize that the agreement or disagreement is about science or scientific evidence, not about the speaker him or herself. In the social world of the classroom, people can be very sensitive to the interpersonal implications of agreeing or disagreeing with a position someone has taken. On the playground, disagreements may ignite an actual conflict or dispute. In science, a disagreement is a way of moving forward, of getting closer to a scientific claim or understanding. But we should not assume that students will take to this norm with ease. In fact, we should expect, anticipate, and deal preemptively with the possibilities for hurt feelings and conflicts. In the text box we have included a more detailed introduction — almost a script — that can be used with older students.

7 A Detailed Introduction The following introduction, written by an experienced teacher, describes how she introduces her older students to many of the norms and moves we've described above. This introduction would probably be overwhelming for younger students, and many teachers might want to break it into smaller sections, introducing different parts at different times. Nevertheless, we include it here to give you an idea of the kinds of issues that should be explicitly addressed, either all at once or over time. One thing that most people don't know about science is that it is a team sport – like soccer or football or baseball. Scientists work in teams. They figure out how things work by talking together, and by discussing each other’s ideas. So it is very important for scientists to talk and listen effectively. We’re going to be scientists working on teams in this class as well. So you have to be clear, and explain your thinking well, and you have to listen hard to others. And if you don’t understand something (or if you didn’t hear what someone said), YOU HAVE TO SPEAK UP and ask the person to repeat. You may be used to the kind of science class where the teacher asks the questions, you give the answers, and then the teacher tells you if you’re right or wrong. If you’re right, your turn is over. If you’re wrong, the teacher then explains to you what the right answer is. This science class is going to be different. Although I’ll still ask you questions, when you give me an answer, I’m going to ask you why you think what you think. But me asking you to explain your reasoning will probably not be the biggest difference between this class and others you’ve had in the past. In fact, a lot of you may be used to this. Here’s what I think will be really different for you: When you give your answer and the reasoning behind it, I am usually not going to tell you whether you’re right or not. Instead, I am going to ask your classmates to respond to your comment in one of several ways: I may ask them to repeat it word for word. I may ask them to restate the comment in their own words. Or, I may ask them to state whether they agree or disagree with your comment and explain why. In this class, when you speak, you’re speaking to everyone in the room, not just me. When you’re not speaking, you need to be listening. By now, you may have two questions. Why am I making you do this? And how are you going to learn how to do this? I’ll talk about the why part first. There are lots of reasons why I want you to learn science this way. The most important one is that I truly believe you’ll learn more science more deeply this way. When I ask you to explain your reasoning or why you agree or disagree with a classmate’s idea, you may at first say to yourself, “Oh, that’s easy to explain.” But when you try to put the right words together, you may find that there are some things you’re still confused about. When you know what’s confusing you, you can then get the help you need. The second reason is that one of the goals I have for you is to become better at communicating scientifically. You live in a world where being able to communicate what you know is just as important as knowing it. One day, you’ll each have a career where you’ll be asked to solve problems. Maybe they'll be science or math problems; maybe they'll be other kinds of problems. You'll also be asked present your solutions in a way so that others understand them and believe that they make sense. This class is going to prepare you to do just that. Now on to the how part. Well, the first thing you need to do is talk. I know it can be scary to speak in public but trust me, the first few times are the hardest. If you’re nervous, make your first few comments only one or two sentences in length just to get over the jitters. Next, you need to talk loudly enough for others to hear. Pretend as though every time you talk you are talking to someone seated on the opposite side of the room. Thirdly, the content of each comment must be related to the science we are doing. Use scientific vocabulary if we’ve agreed on it in class. Talk us through what you think reason by reason. Talk us through your actions step by step. Explain to us the scientific sense behind your questions, your evidence, models, and explanations. You don’t have

8 to say everything perfectly every time, but do strive to make each of your comments as clear and thorough as possible. You also need to listen to what your classmates are saying when they speak. And when I say listen, I mean really listen. I’m not talking about the kind of listening where you hear the words but let them go in one ear and out the other. What you need to do is listen so that you can figure out what the other person thinks and why. If you listen like this, you’ll be ready to respond in a meaningful way so that the discussion keeps moving forward towards scientific understanding. The last point I want to make is that we are in this together. You have my word that your ideas will be respected by your peers and by me. I will do everything I can to make sure that you feel safe to talk about what you know and don’t know. So, as we get started with this endeavor, remember what’s expected of you: Talk loudly and clearly when it’s your turn. When it’s not, listen so that you are ready to respond in a way that brings us closer to scientific understanding. And I’ll be there to help you the whole way. Excerpt adapted from: Chapin, S.H., C. O’Connor, and N.C. Anderson. 2009. Classroom Discussions: Using Math Talk to Help Students Learn, Grades 1-6, Second Edition. Sausalito, CA: Math Solutions Publications. Pp. 156-158. Establishing reasonable and realistic consequences for breaking the rules In all classrooms – in even the most cooperative and well-behaved of groups – there will be occasional violations of the rules. What you do in the face of a violation, whether major or minor, is critical to the success of your efforts to establish a culture conducive to scientifically productive talk. For this reason, from the outset, you will need to think carefully about the consequences for any instance of breaking the rules. This may sound obvious and easy, but in practice it is a complex achievement. Various conditions need to be met. The consequences should be logical, appropriate to the seriousness of violation, and they should make sense to the students. This will require a fair amount of advance discussion and negotiation. The consequences must be made explicit in advance of sanctions; they must be understood and agreed upon collectively. It should be obvious to all when a violation occurs so that students do not perceive you as selective (picking favorites) or as mercurial (sometimes strict, sometimes “nice”). Finally, the consequences should be clear and understood by all so that YOU will know precisely what to do, as you are thinking on your feet, on the fly, in the midst of a discussion of complex ideas. This is indeed a tall order! If these criteria can be met, the students will know exactly what to expect. They will see that you are fair and that all students are being held to the same standard. By invoking the rules consistently, you make it clear that you are creating a safe and predictable environment for the free flow of ideas. All of the students will have the right to be heard, the right to be listened to and responded to respectfully. By the same token, all students will have the obligation to not interrupt classmates, to listen hard and build on one another’s ideas, and to challenge or critique ideas rather than an individual person. Because establishing consequences for breaking the rules is both difficult AND critical to

9 your success, it is helpful to unpack the crucial components that make for reasonable and realistic consequences. •Consequences should be compatible with the behavioral system that is already in place in your classroom or school. Many schools and classrooms already have in place a system for dealing with behavioral infractions. Whether this is called a classroom management system, a behavioral system, or a code of conduct, it contains a series of steps, some minor and some more serious, for dealing with various kinds of infractions. When you institute explicit classroom norms for science talk, it will be very helpful to use the same system. •If your students are new to this kind of talk, bear in mind that early on, they will need reminders, clarifications, and encouragement. It is important to let students know from the beginning that you will hold them accountable to listen to others, to make themselves heard, to address one another respectfully, and so on. However, if this is the first time that students have encountered such rules, it may be very difficult for them to adapt. Good humor and persistence will be needed by the teacher to bring things along in a friendly and positive manner. The example below is meant to address these issues. •Be prepared to continue reinforcing the new norms consistently throughout the school year. Every teacher we know says that although many students take to these discourse norms enthusiastically, the teacher must remain vigilant throughout the year. Even if it is February or March, an increase in disrespect may have a negative impact on classroom work throughout the rest of the school year. An example Mrs. Lillo, a sixth grade teacher in an urban middle school, starts the year off by handing out copies to each student in her science class of the “Green Sheet.” Each student gets a copy and is told to keep it as the first page in his or her science notebook. Student Rights 1. You have the right to make a contribution to an attentive, responsive, audience. 2. You have the right to ask questions. 3. You have the right to be treated civilly. 4. You have the right to have your ideas discussed, not you. Student Obligations 1. You are obligated to speak loudly enough for others to hear. 2. You are obligated to listen for understanding. 3. You are obligated to agree or disagree (and explain why) in response to other people's ideas.

10 The Green Sheet contains the ground rules for classroom talk in Mrs. Lillo’s class. She has developed these over a number of years, so she no longer negotiates them with the students anew every fall. Instead she hands them out and has a discussion about them, in which she asks students to put the rules into their own words. She then tries to elicit from students the reasons that these are good rules. From that point on, for the next week or so, she reminds them of the rules, pointing out any infraction. If the infraction is serious in nature, she stops the class, has everyone turn to the “Green Sheet” in their binders and find a rule that relates to that particular infraction. She then discusses that rule at length. Over a period of weeks, the rules become thoroughly internalized and Mrs. Lillo rarely needs to refer to the Green Sheet. But it is always a resource, available to be pulled out and reviewed if things go off the track. Below is a brief example, adapted from conversations that have taken place in Mrs. Lillo’s room. In this example, students have been getting used to the norms set forth in the Green Sheet for about four days. It is early in the year. Students are reviewing the concept of a ratio, leading up to a unit on density. Mrs. Lillo has posed the following scenario to the kids: A friend of yours says to you “There’s going to be a really great party this weekend at Serena’s. It’s going to be a ‘two-pizza’ party.” You happen to really, really LOVE pizza. So what more information do you need to find out in order to determine if this indeed is going to be a great party? Jasmine: Well, I’d like to know what my friend means by a “two-pizza party.” Like does this mean there’s going to be two pizzas for Ronda: every person? That would definitely be a party I’d go to. Mrs. L: But wait. Does a “two-pizza party” mean there are gonna be Jonathan: two pizzas total? And then in that case, I’d like to know how Mrs. L: many people they’re expecting to show up. If it’s like 5, that’d Jonathan: be OK, but if there’s gonna be 30 people and 2 pizzas, no way Mrs. L: José! Jonathan: Jonathan, do you agree with what Ronda just said? Um, I didn’t hear what she said. So what are you supposed to do if you don’t hear? Um, ask her to repeat what she said? Absolutely. Go ahead, ask her. Ronda, can you repeat what you just said? The Green Sheet says that students have an obligation to hear the contributions of others. Later in the year, Mrs. Lillo will give a warning to students who are not able to respond to a question about another student’s contribution. Already, Mrs. Lillo has told them that if they cannot hear they must ask for a repeat. However, it is only the first week of using the Green Sheet, and students are not yet used to having the obligation to be accountable for every student utterance. So she chooses wisely simply to enforce the requirement by having Jonathan ask Jasmine to

11 repeat. This is hardly a terrible imposition on Jonathan, but having to go through this routine is sometimes enough to make students pay attention! Ronda repeats her idea and the conversation continues on: Jonathan: I agree with Ronda. We have to figure out how many people are going to be at this party and whether there’s going to be two pizzas for Mrs. L: everyone, or like 2 pizzas for every 5 or so people, or two pizzas total. Emily: Does anyone think they can put Jonathan’s idea into their own words? Mrs. L: What’s he saying we have to know? Jonathan: Mrs. L: I think he’s saying it all depends on what two pizzas is compared to. I mean, it’s like two pizzas per what? Per person? Per entire group? Martin: Per every 4 or 5 people? Two pizzas per 30 kids? In that case, count George: me out! Is that what you meant Jonathan? Yep. Does anyone remember what we call this kind of idea, when you are comparing one quantity -- like how much pizza -- to some other quantity -- like how many people? Um … a ratio (pause) because I looked back in my notebook. [softly] Cheater. Although George says it softly, everyone hears it. Mrs. Lillo knows that Martin and George are friends. Georges’s comment may have been mean-spirited or may simply have been meant playfully. But Mrs. Lillo also knows from long experience that she cannot, this early in the year, let such comments go unchallenged. She stops, looks around the class until all eyes are focused on her, and says, “Alright everyone. Take out your Green Sheets.” A faint groan is heard. The students have already been through this several times in the last several days. Everyone takes out their Green Sheet. Mrs. Lillo says “We need to make sure that we follow these rules that we all agreed to accept. OK everyone, look down the list until you find one of the points that fits this situation.” The students read the list. Ernie raises his hand. “Is it the one that says ‘Everyone has a right to be treated civilly’?” A brief discussion ensues about what “treated civilly” means. Although the class has discussed this item before, it is obvious that several students still do not have a clear sense of its implications. At the end of the discussion about civility, Mrs. Lillo feels fairly sure that all students now do have a clear idea about what an infraction of this sort is all about. She makes a general statement, tying in this norm with the larger system of classroom management that she already has in place. She says “OK, from now on, anyone who does not treat fellow students civilly will get a warning. The second time, it’s a color change. Are we agreed?” The students nod. (In Mrs. Lillo’s school, each student starts the day on green. A warning is given for misbehavior, and a further infraction results in a change to yellow. After one more warning, another infraction puts a student ‘on red’ and the parent is called after school.)

12 From this point onward in the semester, Mrs. Lillo faithfully and consistently enforces this rule. Disrespectful comments get a warning. Repeat offenses get the offender a color change. Students know that she will enforce the rule consistently, and this helps them behave consistently. Mrs. Lillo has advice for new teachers on how to enforce the rules from day one in the school year. She says: You have to make sure they understand what the rules mean. On the first day, and during the first week or two, you just have to keep going back to the Green Sheet. After the first day or two, they moan and groan every time I say ‘ok, take out the Green Sheet,’ but they do it. And eventually they know those rules. I don’t have to make them actually take it out and reread it every time. But don’t think that you won’t have to enforce the rules after the first month! These are good kids, but they backslide like crazy all through the year. Particularly when it gets close to holidays, or when other things are stressing them out. So you have to be determined and just keep enforcing the norms consistently, week in and week out. Mrs. Lillo’s class is known for its good behavior. But what is more striking is the way her students appear to be willing to ask questions, put forward their ideas, and respond fully to her questions. We see these as signs that Mrs. Lillo has succeeded in making her classroom a safe place for students to engage in challenging academic thinking, problem posing, theorizing, and problem-solving. Customizing your enforcement of the norms Every classroom is different, and each teacher must find a way that works for them. In some classrooms, students will have no problem repeating the words of other students, and openly agreeing and disagreeing with ideas in a civil manner. Some students will have had experience at home with this type of discourse. On the other hand, some students may never in their lives have had a conversation with peers in which they disagreed on some school-based intellectual matter. It may feel strange for them, and you may feel uncomfortable asking them to do this. It will take a good deal of care and attention to get things working smoothly in the latter situation. Some students may find it difficult to understand why you are asking them to participate in these strange sorts of interchanges. Don’t forget that you must provide a rationale for the moves you are using and asking your students to use. For example, imagine that early on in the year you think your students feel beleaguered by being asked to repeat another student’s contribution in their own words. What should you do? You can stop the lesson and have a conversation about that issue. You might say “Why do you think I am asking you to repeat what another student said?” See who does and does not have an idea about this. Reiterate that each of them must be able to hear and respond on the basis of what they have heard. Why? “So that all of us can learn from one another; so that we can build on each other’s ideas; so that we are all on the same page” and so on. On the other hand, your class may seem quite comfortable agreeing and disagreeing with one another. This may bring other problems. In the heat of the discussion some of our norms may appear to be unnecessary niceties. For example, we suggest that students state their agreements

13 or disagreements in terms of what another student has said, not in terms of that student. They should say “I disagree with Juan’s claim” or “I disagree with what he said.” They should avoid saying “I disagree with Juan” or “I disagree with him.” In the heat of a good discussion, you may not want to slow them down by insisting that they formulate their agreements and disagreements in terms of the claims or ideas, not the person. We encourage you, however, to stick with these careful formulations. Often the students who are most able to engage in avid discussion are least sensitive about such things. There are probably a dozen other students in the same classroom who find it mortifying when someone disagrees with them. These students usually can get used to someone disagreeing with an idea of theirs. They too can then say “I disagree with what I said before!” In your class, the most effective way to deal with first-time violations of respectful discourse may be to ask the student who has been disrespectful to apologize publicly. A simple reminder that your norms do not allow for disrespectful behavior, and a request for an apology to the target student may for many students be a sufficient deterrent. It is hard for some teachers to imagine giving a student a warning, or a check mark, or a color change for simply saying that they were unable to hear or understand another student. We want to emphasize that you must use this according to your own judgment. One student may not have good auditory retention and might not be able to easily repeat. In this case you would avoid asking that student to repeat when the first student’s utterance was long and complicated. Another student might use your rules against you, ‘gaming the system’ by pretending not to understand or not be able to hear. In this case your own judgment will tell you that it is reasonable, after an introductory ‘breaking in’ period, to let such students know that you will not be taken in. In one case we observed, such a student claimed several times that day that he had not heard what another student had just said. The teacher finally asked three other students sitting around him to repeat what the student had said. All of them could do it. She pointed out that if everyone else heard, he could have too, if he had been listening. She then gave him a color change. Some teachers have few problems with disrespect, but greater problems with students who seem too shy or afraid to participate. These are cases where you must take into consideration the backgrounds, personalities and abilities of these students. For further comments on these matters, see Section 4 below, on equitable participation, and Section 5, on trouble-shooting. 3. Practicing the norms for the first time So now you have discussed with your students the new classroom norms for academically productive talk. In Section 2, we discussed how these norms should be encouraged and enforced. But now you must consider how to actually start using talk moves and these new norms. Your students are looking up at you expectantly: how will things change in the classroom after discussion of these new norms? What are they actually supposed to do? As with any subject you teach, one encounter with the material is not enough. You cannot simply tell students about this kind of talk and expect it to take hold smoothly. Some students have

14 understood the discussion, others may not have. Some may already have forgotten the bulk of what you all agreed to. So what is your next step? As with other academic subjects, you must provide an opportunity for students to put into practice what they are learning. Your first sessions of academically productive talk practice will involve three things. First, you must give students something to talk about; a topic or activity that will provide fodder for a sustained session of talk. Next, you must be prepared to consistently use some of the talk moves for teachers that will help ensure that the talk is productive. Finally, you must be prepared to consistently support students’ use of talk moves. The students themselves must become comfortable with these forms of interaction and they will need your help at first. Only after you and they can easily and comfortably use the talk moves can the full benefits of academically productive talk become apparent. Choosing a topic and activity What should you use as a topic for your first session? And how should that topic be embedded in an activity? First, it should be a topic that is relatively familiar. You and your students are engaging in a practice that is essentially new and strange. They may be struggling to respond in the ways you have agreed on. At first, some students may find it challenging to use even a straightforward phrase like “I agree with what she said, because...” You do not want to make the first session of even more challenging by trying to teach new academic content at the same time. Therefore, choose a topic that you know all students in your class have some familiarity with. It can be a topic that you covered earlier in the year, or something from a previous grade. It may also be a slight variation of a topic you are currently working on. For example, you might create an “analogue” problem to one you did the previous day – same basic idea but different materials, or the same data presented in a different graphical representation. Second, there has to be something to say about this topic. It should be a topic that can sustain interest and invite many different contributions. Your solution will, obviously, depend upon the subject area you are working in. As a rule of thumb, the question you use to launch your discussion should support at least two reasonable positions that can be argued for, with evidence. In science, a good discussion launcher might be a question about an imminent demonstration. For example, “when I pour this sugar into the pitcher of water and it all dissolves, with the pitcher weigh more, less, or stay the same?” Such a question will trigger a discussion that can then be continued after the demonstration takes place. Third, you should choose an activity that will support plenty of whole-group talk and participation. There are many excellent academic activities that are not well-suited for whole- group talk, so the choice of an activity may require some thought.

15 Supporting Talk within the Activity After you have chosen your topic and activity, and you have introduced the activity, you will have an opportunity to guide the practice of your students in producing academically productive talk. Here we provide a few examples for you to consider. One teacher we have worked with has had great success introducing productive talk in math in the context of discussions centered around a problem that invites many different solution paths. She chooses a topic that is not new to the students, but that offers many possibilities for interesting variations on core problems. She then finds a problem that can be solved in different ways. She creates several versions of the problem, including one that is set up using “friendly” numbers that every student in the class has a chance of solving. Starting with this “friendly numbers” version, the teacher begins by asking all of the students to solve the problem on their own. She then convenes a large-group discussion where students present their solutions. Here is a short constructed example of how such a lesson might proceed. It is not based on an actual transcript, but instead is an amalgam of many classroom lessons we have observed. Here is the problem: Clea and Tania are germinating fast plants under two different conditions. Clea’s 20 seeds are in direct sunlight, and Tania’s 16 seeds are in an area where they get no direct sunlight. (Four of Tania’s seeds grew mold and were discarded.) In Clea’s case, 5 out of 20 have germinated by day 2. In Tania’s case, 3 out of 15 have germinated by day 2. Who has a better record so far? 1 Teacher: So how did you solve this, Teo? 2 Teo: First I put down five and three, and then I decided Clea’s was better. 3 Teacher: OK, so Barbara, can you repeat what Teo just said? 4 Barbara: I... he--I didn’t hear him. 5 Teacher: OK, so what did we agree that you need to do if you can’t hear? 6 Barbara: [looks embarrassed, sits silently] 7 Teacher: Marta, can you help out? What do you do if you can’t hear? 8 Marta: Ask them to repeat? 9 Teacher: Right. So Barbara, can you do that? 10 Barbara: Teo, can you repeat what you said? 11 Teo: Um, I said that I thought Clea was better because she had five and Tania had three. 12 Teacher: OK, Barbara, can you repeat that? 13 Barbara: He said he thought Clea was better because she had five and Tania had three. 14 Teacher: OK, so do you agree or disagree with what Teo just said? 15 Barbara: Um, I think I disagree because I don’t know what he means by the three and the five. 16 Teacher: So Teo, do you think you can explain to us a bit more why you think Clea’s record was better? Three and five what? 17 Teo: Well, Tania had only three plants germinate and Clea had five. So Clea is doing better.

16 18 Teacher: OK, so you’re suggesting that Tania had fewer plants germinate in the shade, and so Clea’s seem to be doing better in the sun? Is that what you’re saying? [Teo nods] OK, so let’s hear from other people. Did anybody solve it a different way, or come up with a different answer? Sharlina? 19 Sharlina: I turned it into a fraction. 20 Teacher: OK, how does that work? (long pause) Can anyone build on what Sharlina’s idea? She said she used fractions. 21 Greg: I did the same thing. I turned them both into a fraction. 22 Teacher: Thanks for your contribution, Greg, but I’m wondering if you can build on Sharlina’s point and take it further. Can you say more about you both did and why? Let’s look a bit more closely at this classroom talk. How does this teacher use the student presentations of solutions to foster their beginning use of academically productive talk? We can see that she makes sure to use the move of asking students to repeat what another student just said. This lets students know that they are accountable for hearing and understanding what another student said. We can also see that she prompts students to engage with one another’s contributions by asking them whether they agree or disagree. She also makes sure to revoice what some students are saying, in order to give all students time to understand each contribution, and to emphasize that she is listening and relating their contributions to one another. In addition to asking students to repeat each others' comments, or to \"say it in your own words,\" she asks the students if they can \"build on what Sharlina said.\" Moreover, when Greg responded by simply repeating Sharlina’s idea (something that happens commonly when students are beginning to use talk this way), the teacher holds the student accountable for adding something new, for making a contribution of substance. Another way to respond when a student says something similar to what the previous student said is to ask a question like, \"Is your idea the same as Leona’s or are you adding something new?” or “How is your idea sort of like Leona's, but also sort of different?\" This session is about proportional reasoning, an important and recurring topic, so it is contributing to the mathematics and science learning of these students. However, it is not the first time they have encountered the topic. The teacher may have thought that Teo would have a better understanding than he apparently has. However, despite his lack of facility with proportional reasoning, this problem is providing a chance for all of the students to engage with familiar material. Some students have not mastered it, while others have. The explanations of students that understand the material can be emphasized and returned to, discussed and taken apart. In this way, the use of academically productive talk is fostered while students learn. But because the material is relatively familiar, students are able to handle the new forms of interaction that are being required of them. As in all subject areas, a good launching question to support an academically productive discussion will be a question that has more than one answer for which reasonable arguments can be made. Often a question that has at least two possible answers, framed as a forced-choice question, will support what has been called a “position-driven discussion,” where the teacher’s role is not to indicate correctness (by evaluating student answers), but rather to support the

17 students to explicate their thinking and respond to the thinking of their peers. In science, you might have a centrally placed experimental setup which bears upon aspects of the phenomena being investigated. For example, if the topic at hand is buoyancy and density, the question posed might be, “Here is a copper cube, suspended at the end of a coil spring. What will happen when I lower the cube into a pitcher of water? Will the spring get longer, shorter, or stay the same?” ? A? -or- B? -or- C? The top end of the spring is hanging on a nail. The bottom end of the spring, where the copper cube is attached, is free to move. At first, the cube is hanging inside an empty glass jar. Then water is poured into the jar. Q: When the cube is surrounded by water, what will happen to the spring? A: The spring will... . A get longer. B get shorter. C stay the same length. © Richard Sohmer, 2002 If the topic is volume, a good discussion launcher might be, “If I folded this piece of paper (8 1/2 x 11 inches) from end to end to form a cylinder, would the volume of the cylinder be larger if I folded it from top to bottom or from side to side?” or 8 1/2” 11”

18 Talk about representations: A good deal of productive science talk can occur during student presentations of their work to the entire class. It is helpful to ask students to develop representations under circumstances when one would expect a variety of representational solutions. Each student has participated in this activity and has ideas to bring to bear on someone else’s work. Students can then be asked to interpret others’ charts or graphs. This provides many opportunities to practice students at listening to one another and trying hard to be clear. Students can then be asked to provide friendly critiques of each others’ representations (with evidence), make suggestions for revising representations, and discuss the important scientific ideas that different representations make easy or hard to see. In addition, it is helpful for teachers to continually highlight (and model in talk) conversations about what different representational conventions SHOW and what they HIDE, because all representations show some things but hide others. A WORD ABOUT “EVALUATING” STUDENT CONTRIBUTIONS (OR EMPHASIZING “CORRECT” ANSWERS). You have likely read about the fact that the most common pattern of classroom talk (throughout the country and at all grade levels) is recitation, the IRE (Initiation- Response-Evaluation) sequence where the teacher asks a question, a student responds, and the teacher evaluates the student’s contribution, saying, “Good,” or “Not quite, anyone else have an idea?” Because this pattern is so deeply ingrained in teachers’ and students’ experience, it is very, very hard to change. But in order to orchestrate an academically productive discussion in working through a problem for which students have the tools to figure things out for themselves, the evaluation move (the E of the IRE) is often important to avoid, so that students are put in the position of evaluating the reasonableness and cogency of their classmates’ ideas. And this is perhaps the most challenging but also the most transformational change in one’s teaching as you take on this new discussion practice. It is nothing short of a sea change! Why should this be the case? A good framing question for a meaning-making discussion is, by design, one which will support divergence in student thinking — multiple solution paths, more than one interpretation, different ways of representing data, multiple models or explanations for a particular phenomenon, or different positions on the significance of some finding. The goal is for multiple student positions to emerge, get explicated and interrogated by the students, with the result that some ideas will be found to be compelling and others incorrect or inadequate. Some are going to be better than others; some will mistaken; some will be unexpected; some will be full of depth and cogency. But in all of this, the teacher’s job in facilitating the discussion, is to help the students clarify their ideas, take each other’s ideas seriously, and for the students to critically evaluate them.

19 The point of a well-designed basic question is that it will provide a “problem space” where students’ ideas will diverge, and where they will have to articulate their position (claim, solution, conjecture, etc.) and argue for it with evidence. The role of the teacher in these meaning-making discussions is NOT to telegraph to students that one idea is better than others, or that one student’s contribution is incorrect, or to subtly scaffold the students into getting the answer in the teacher’s head. The ideal teacher role, in contrast, is to help the students explicate their ideas clearly, as fully as possible, with evidence, so that OTHER STUDENTS can think with these ideas, agree or disagree, add to them, challenge elements, support them or complexify them with alternative evidence, etc. That is, these discussions are designed with a framing question that pushes the students, themselves, to “do the heavy lifting.” By heavy lifting, we mean that it is the students’ job to think critically, muster evidence, challenge their peers’ evidence or reasoning, ask questions of one another, integrate their thinking with others, judge the value of an idea (not the person putting it forward), in evaluating their own and others’ evidence and arguments — in short to come up with their own cogent and well argued answers to important questions. In the context of a problem designed to support student reasoning, the standard “evaluation” move (telegraphing correctness) on the part of the teacher is actually detrimental to the process. This is a strong claim and likely to be highly counterintuitive. Why would an evaluation move — a move that lets students know that they are on the right track or that they are mistaken — be a problem? Isn’t correctness and understanding, after all, the goal here? The answer is a simple one. Reasoning and the building and weighing arguments with evidence is more important in the long run than getting the right answer in the short run. Reasoning and argument will lead, over time, to deep and canonical (or correct) understanding of important concepts and will help students become powerful, life-long thinkers and learners. When the teacher evaluates a student’s contribution, the reasoning aspect of the intellectual game the students are engaged in comes to an abrupt halt. Students stop thinking for themselves, and start orienting to the teacher, and moreover, orienting to the correct answer (as telegraphed by the teacher as authority figure). If the teacher evaluates (even subtly) students’ ideas as right or wrong, or better and worse, two things happen: 1) the students lose their motivation to think for themselves and 2) the students orient to the teacher and to “getting the right answer” rather than figuring things out. Game over. Rather than reasoning through the problem for themselves, the focus becomes one of “getting the right answer,” and by extension, seeming smart (or if wrong, not so smart). Students will stop pursuing their line of reasoning, if they get the sense it is incorrect, without having the chance to understand what’s wrong with it. Students will stop pursuing their line of reasoning if their answer is evaluated as correct, because that has become the point, rather than deep understanding. The orientation of the group shifts from one of thinking to one of correctness and seeming smart. Students stop taking risks

20 or pressing for a position that has been evaluated as lacking. They don’t ask for clarification, because that would telegraph to the rest of the group that they aren’t all that smart. They stop putting in effort because, once the right answer is on the table, the game is over. Carol Dweck and her colleagues have carried out numerous studies (at various grade levels and across many different subject areas) demonstrating that when teachers emphasize correctness, students take on a maladaptive “mind set” for learning. They come to think that some students are just smarter than others and effort doesn’t matter. In fact, putting in effort or asking questions simply telegraphs to others that you’re not that smart to begin with. Students develop what Dweck calls “performance goals” (working to get a good grade, the right answer, or to look smart) rather than “learning goals” (working to actually understand or learn something). Performance goals have been shown to correlate with decreased risk-taking, decreased effort, unwillingness to persist when the tasks get challenging, and less overall learning. Teachers who have become successful leaders of academically productive discussions universally say that learning how to provide non-evaluative responses to students’ ideas, in the midst of a discussion, is the single hardest thing to get the hang of. It’s so contrary to what they have been doing for much of their teaching — that is, helping, nudging, suggesting, telegraphing, assisting, rephrasing their question, reminding students what they did the day before, etc., etc. — guiding students to get the preferred answer, interpretation, or line of thinking. Teachers say that they really struggle at first to provide a “non-judgmental” response to a student’s idea — especially if it is a correct and cogent one! They talk about all sorts of strategies to avoid an evaluation or judgment. Instead of saying, “Great!” or “Right” or “I like that idea” they say, “Hmmmm… interesting…” (in a thoughtful but neutral tone) and look down at their hands or off into the distance for a moment. Expert discussion leaders say that just that little bit of wait time gives them a good idea for what to say next: “Hmmm…can you say more about that?” or “What do the rest of you think about that idea?” or “Can anyone put into their own words what Hugo just said?” or “Let me see if I’ve got your idea right. Are you saying…?” (with space for the student to follow up) or “Hmmmm…” with a thoughtful nod of the head, a glance up at the ceiling, and more waiting. After a while, invariably, someone else speaks up! In The Talk Science Primer, you will find a set of all-purpose follow up moves, linked to 4 important goals for productive discussion that will help open up the conversation, rather than close it down. But be prepared: it is going to feel strange at first to be non-judgmental, not telegraphing your evaluation of correctness either verbally or nonverbally. It feels strange whether the student contribution is brilliant or wildly incorrect. If it’s brilliant, it seems cruel not to jump up and down and celebrate, to boost this student’s self esteem. If it’s incorrect, it seems like malpractice not to set the students straight. But this is where the leap of faith comes in. When students are expected to do the “heavy lifting,” to listen hard and critically to their peers, they rise to the challenge and do it! Invariably, when someone makes a mistake, if you treat the comment as interesting and important, someone will raise a question or an objection. And if they don’t, you can say, “Can you say more about that?” and help them explain their reasoning further. (This entails another leap of faith, the belief that students actually do have reasons behind wrong answers and these can be very productive to examine as a group.) If a student with an incorrect idea says more, or alternatively if you revoice their incorrect idea, chances are

21 that someone will speak up and challenge it.2 Note that it’s very important that you ask students to repeat, to expand, to clarify their thinking when they have wrong as well as right answers. That way, you are not telegraphing (even subtly) what you think the right answer is. In the end, the students will be doing the evaluating of ideas, with evidence, and they will be developing their capacity as reasoners and explainers of important academic ideas. The boost in their self esteem will come naturally as they become more expert thinkers, able to hold their own in any kind of situation that requires evidence and reasoned argument! How long will it take for students to get used to this? The answer to the question “how long will it take?” of course will depend on a number of factors – the age of the students, the previous experiences students have had with this kind of talk, the climate in the school at large, and the chemistry and ethos of the particular group. As a general rule, it takes about six months to a year for students to really get proficient at doing academically productive talk, assuming the teacher establishes norms effectively and uniformly holds students accountable to the agreed upon ground rules. While that may sound like a very long time – far longer than many teachers might on the face of it expect – this is what has been found in a wide range of schools and with a wide range of teachers. And while a year of diligent effort might seem like a long and grueling process, there is good news at the end of it. We have found that once students are well socialized into this way of talking, it is theirs for life. They carry it with them into the next school year and beyond, and they carry it with them from teacher to teacher within the same school. It’s thus wise to think of this as an investment in these children that will have huge academic pay offs in the long-term educational life of these students and in the short and long-term effectiveness of the school as a whole. And of course, to the extent that all of the faculty at a grade level and within a school work together to implement this kind of talk, the academic impact is stronger and more quickly noticeable. An additional benefit is that once students are well socialized at using academically productive talk in teacher-guided discussions, they use it with one another in small group work and during partner talk. The effect then spreads throughout the classroom day, with students making more productive use of their own talk-time with peers. And finally, the more practiced students become at explicating their reasoning publicly and hearing others explain the evidence for their positions, the more likely they are to use these “ways of talking” in their writing. This translates directly into more extended writing of explanations in open-response standardized tests. 2 And if even after student has clearly explicated their incorrect thinking or you have given voice to it, no one in the group notices, then you know either that the group is simply not listening to one another (a different kind of problem that has to be dealt with), or there are some major problems with the group’s understanding in general, and perhaps the task is not at the right level for the group’s current understanding. A good framing question always poses a problem that the group has the tools and capacity to figure out for themselves, with support. Sometimes teachers make the mistake of asking a question for a meaning-making discussion that the kids simply have no basis for knowing or figuring out. Ultimately, in these cases, the teacher has to lead them in a recitation or tell them the answer.

22 4. Norms for Equitable Participation Now you have considered how to introduce the norms to your students and how to sanction violations of the norms and how to encourage students to use them consistently. You have also planned on how to begin practicing the norms with a well-designed task that will provoke interesting talk. But there is still one more element that you must consider. You must find ways to make sure that all students are included in this new set of practices in your classroom. You must ensure equitable access to participation in productive science talk. But what does equitable participation mean? Equitable participation does not mean that everyone has to talk in every conversation. Rather it means that access to the conversation is equitably distributed. What does access to a conversation entail? First of all, it assumes that there is a coherent and rigorous conversation being held, not merely a round-robin turn-taking event where everyone gets to put their two cents in. Remember that not all talk is academically productive. The talk must be accountable to knowledge, evidence, and reasoning, not simply polite. Assuming that the conversation is rigorous and coherent, equitable participation entails that everyone can hear what is being said. It means that everyone has equal rights to develop their ideas and be heard and taken seriously by all. It is not equitable if certain kids routinely dominate the conversation and others get routinely excluded. But again, this does NOT mean that the goal is simply making sure that each student gets to say something. It’s rather about ensuring that the conversation is focused and rigorous and each student can hear what is being said and has opportunities to find a place in the conversation to contribute a relevant idea. A variety of turn-taking strategies There are a number of different techniques teachers can use to promote equitable turn-taking and participation. Teacher allocates turns As alluded to above, teachers often take charge of allocating turns, deciding who talks and in what order. This strategy allows you to call on students strategically to create more equitable participation. In this case, it is helpful to use wait time before calling on anyone, to give more students a chance to think about the question and raise their hand. Then, with a variety of students to choose from, you can pick and chose contributors with an eye towards balancing out participation. You can actively solicit less verbal participants, saying “I’d like to hear from someone who hasn’t yet gotten a chance to talk.” You can invoke the “gender rule” if you sense that boys (or girls) are dominating the conversation. Another strategy for managing equitable turn- taking, particularly at the very beginning of a discussion, is the random call approach (using popsicle sticks with each student’s name on a stick, or some mechanism to ensure equal probability of a student getting called on). If you ask a question and many, many students want to speak, you can simply resort to the “popsicle sticks” which puts everyone on notice that they have to listen and be prepared to participate. Once a discussion is well underway, the random call technique might not be wise, as the