Developing Academic Language through Instructional Conversations

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Developing Academic Languagethrough
Instructional Conversations

• Robin C. Scarcella, UC Irvine
• rcscarce_at_uci.edu

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Robin ScarcellaProgram in Academic English and
ESLUniversity of California - Irvine
rcscarce_at_uci.edu
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Agenda

• Structured conversations
• How not to engage students in conversations
• Critical features
• Lesson cycles
• Sentence stems

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What are Structured Conversations?

• Structured conversations always entail extended
  dialogue between teachers and students and
  between classmates about topics and tasks that
  are relevant to students and have educational
  value

• They always develop students language and
  complex thinking skills.

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Structured Conversations

• Discussion-based lessons carried out with the
  assistance of others who help students arrive at
  a deeper understanding of the academic content.
  Structured conversations provide opportunities
  for students to use language in ways that promote
  analysis, reflection, and critical thinking.

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What do structured conversations do?

• Allow students to work together as a class, in
  small groups, or even in pairs to maximize their
  own language learning as well as that of others.

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These classroom interactions create
opportunities for students conceptual and
linguistic development by making connections
between academic content, students prior
knowledge and cultural experiences.
The interactions have to be VERY carefully
structured to teach language. Language
development will necessarily emerge through
unstructured conversations.
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Lets start with how not to engage students in
conversations.

• Begin by ignoring language objectives. Dont
  provide a comprehensive, coordinated plan for
  using instructional conversations to help
  students reach specific language objectives,
  improve specific skills, and/or gain specific
  types of knowledge.

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A Big Concern Language Objectives
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How not to engage students in conversations

• Make sure learners have daily prolonged
  unstructured conversations and no instruction.
  Never teach students the language skills and
  features that they need to participate in
  conversations.

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Grouping Practices
Ineffective Effective
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How not to engage students in conversations

• Dont provide direct, explicit instruction of
  language embedded in content that students can
  use in their conversations.
• Dont provide feedback.
• Dont worry about struggling learners.
• Dont provide students with any special
  scaffolding.

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Scaffolding

• Scaffolding is a means by which students receive
  support in various forms from their teachers in
  an effort to promote the development of specific
  language skills and features as well as
  understanding.
• Scaffolding eventually results in independence
  through the careful reduction of support as
  students make progress.

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Critical Features
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Critical Feature 1

• Teachers and Students-- Interacting Together to
  Achieve Learning

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Joint Production

• Experts and novices work together on a common
  goal.

This increases the amount of exposure to language
that learners receive. It also increases their
opportunities to use language.
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Critical Feature 2

• Teachers-- Scaffolding the Students Language
  Development

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Critical Feature 3

• Teachers-Connecting Language Use to Students
  Lives and Experiences-When Appropriate.

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Higher-Level Thinking

• Teachers challenging students to think critically
  and develop complex thought (application,
  analysis, synthesis, evaluation)

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Critical Feature 5

• Teachers and Students --Participating in Extended
  Conversation

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Critical Feature 6

• Students -- Having Many Opportunities to Respond

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Critical Feature 7

• Teachers-- Providing Feedback on Language Use

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Structured Conversations

• To participate in conversation, students need
  to know
• a lot of language.
• Mere exposure to language in the course of
  conversation does not guarantee the students
  acquisition of language.

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Lesson Cycle or Sequence
Structured conversations in teaching
learners generally entail a series of activities
or a lesson cycle or sequence leading up to a
final extended conversation.
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Step 1 Building Interest

• Teachers introduce the conversational task and
  build interest in it.

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Step 2 Teaching Language

• Teachers identify and teach 3-4 features of the
  language that the students need to use in
  conversation but do not know or have difficulty
  using.

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Vocabulary

• Everyday words used in comparisons that express
  relationships in time, space, quantity,
  direction, order, size, and age
• most, many, less, longer, and least.
• Everyday words that express comparisons and link
  sentences and that express logical relationships
  such as same, alike, different from, opposite
  of, almost, exactly, not quite.

Source Wong-Fillmore. L. 2004.
http//www.scoe. org/aiming_high/docs/AH_language.
pdf
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Fixed Expressions

• Equivalent to
• Different from
• Similar to

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Grammar
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Three Syllable or More Adjectives

• Put 'more/most in front
• expensive ----- more expensive
• expensive ---- most expensive

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One Syllable Adjectives

• Add 'er / est
• short -----shorter
• shorter-----shortest

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Step 3 Model and Practice

• Give students multiple opportunities to hear
• you use language.

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Perfect Practice in Conversation
Adapted from David Howe 2006
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Step 3 Practice -- Sentence Strips
Teachers can give students sentence strips to use
when modeling and practicing comparison
constructions.

• ______ and ______are similar.
• Each (is / has) ___________.
• Like __________, _____________ also has
  _________.
• A significant similarity between the two is
  ____________.

Source Marsha Zandi, UCSD Teacher Professional
Development
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Sentence Strips

• Although they share many similarities,
  ____________ differs from ____________ because
  ________________.
• Unlike _______, _______ (is/has)
  _________________.
• One important difference between the two is
  __________.
• Perhaps, the most significant difference is
  _______________ because __________________.

Source Marsha Zandi, UCSD Teacher Professional
Development
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Step 3 Practice -- Graphic Organizers

• Teachers tell students to complete charts with
  partners, e.g., a Venn Diagram Chart comparing
  two movies or TV shows.

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Step 3 More Practice -- Highly Scaffolded
Instructional Conversation

• First
• - Partner A begins by asking questions.
• - Partner B answers the questions.
• Second
• Partner B asks the questions and Partner A
  answers the questions.

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Step 4 Feedback

• Feedback
• The teacher explicitly explains and
• models language features while students are
  engaged
• The teacher guides students while they
• practice the features and, if needed,
  provides
• instructional feedback
• The teacher provides opportunities for
• students to use the features themselves
• and reinforces student correct responses

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Step 5 The Instructional Conversation

• The teacher asks students to use language
  features in an extended conversation, e.g., to
  compare two movies or TV shows and recommend one
  to their classmates.
• As the students discuss the movies with
  classmates, the teacher scaffolds language use
  and asks probing questions.

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Your Turn Use sentence stems to compare two
books or two short stories.
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Your Turn

• Come up with 4 behaviors (or actions) that
  teachers could use to engage students in
  structured conversations that improve their
  students language.

Example The teacher groups students, carefully
assigning speaking roles to each student to
ensure all students talk.
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Lets look at the activities that Roland Tharp
and Ronald Gallimore (1989) discuss.
Did you identify any of these actions
or behaviors?
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Teacher Actions/Behaviors

• The teacher creates a challenging but
  non-threatening atmosphere. The teacher creates
  an atmosphere that challenges students and allows
  them to understand and discuss the meaning of the
  text.
• The teacher responds to student contributions.
  While having an initial plan and maintaining the
  focus and coherence of discussions about reading
  passages, the teacher is also responsive to
  students' statements.
•  

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Teacher Actions/Behaviors

• The teacher promotes discussion. Much of the
  discussion centers on questions and answers for
  which there might be more than one correct
  answer.
• The teacher encourages students to build on
  others comments. The discussion is characterized
  by multiple, interactive, connected utterances
  succeeding utterances build upon and extend
  previous ones.

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Teacher Actions/Behaviors

• The teacher encourages general participation
  among students. The teacher does not hold
  exclusive right to determine who talks, and
  students are encouraged to volunteer or otherwise
  influence the selection of speaking turns.

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Teacher Actions/Behaviors

• The teacher selects a theme or idea to serve as a
  stating point to focus the discussion. The
  teacher has a general plan for how the theme will
  unfold and "chunks" the text (divides it into
  parts) to permit optimal exploration of the theme.

Lots of preparation is required!
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Teacher Actions/Behaviors

• The teacher either "hooks into" or provides
  students with pertinent background knowledge and
  relevant information necessary for understanding
  the text. Background knowledge and information
  are then woven into the discussion that follows.

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Teacher Actions/Behaviors

• The teacher provides direct teaching of language
  features, skills or concepts and scaffolds their
  use in conversation.
• The teacher prepares students to participate
  in the conversation.

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Teacher Actions/Behaviors

• Whenever appropriate, the teacher promotes the
  use of more complex language and expression. The
  teacher elicits more extended student
  contributions by using a variety of elicitation
  techniques a. invitations to expand (Tell me
  more about_____, What do you mean by____?), b.
  restatements (In other words,______), and c.
  pauses, giving students time to respond.

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Teacher Actions/Behaviors

• The teacher promotes students' use of text,
  pictures, and reasoning to support an argument or
  position. The teacher asks students to express
  their opinions, beliefs and explanations.
• How do you know that?
• What makes you think that?

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Teacher Actions/Behaviors

• The teacher increases the effectiveness of
  instructional conversations by designing and
  delivering instruction that provides

• extra support to initially practice new
• language correctly
• extra opportunities to practice new
• language to a fluent level.

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The Role of the Teachers in Final Instructional
Conversation Stage

• Directive
• talking at
• telling how and why
• giving solutions
• telling students what to say

• Facilitator/Learning Manager
• talking with
• asking how and why
• helping students craft solutions
• helping students express themselves

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Teacher Abilities
Ability to use appropriate
questioning techniques
Ability to group effectively
Ability to scaffold language development
Ability to maintain an appropriate sense of
timing and pacing
Ability to multi-task
Ability to engage all students in meaningful
interaction enhancing their learning
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A Critical Consideration

• Classroom Organization/Management

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Grouping Students

• Individual
• Group
• Partner
• Teacher-student
• Student-student
• Student-teacher/
• other students

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Participatory Structures
Classmates and Teacher
Pairs
Groups of Students
Student
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Challenges to Using Structured Conversations In
Language Teaching
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Challenge 1 We tend to acquire the language of
those with whom we associate.
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Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect
practice makes perfect. ..Vince
Lombardi
Students learn new language by correctly
practicing the language repeatedly until the
language is mastered.
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Correctly using language again and again leads to
accuracy and fluency.
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Practice Makes Perfect
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Practice Makes Permanent!
If you practice a feature of language
incorrectly, you can learn it incorrectly!
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How Much Practice is Needed?
Number of correct repetitions in a row of a new
word needed to automatize the word -
NICHD
(R. Lyon, 1997)
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Challenge 2 Students often use informal, basic
forms of language in all contexts--even when
formal, more complex language is required.
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Challenge 3 Students who are just beginning to
acquire language will have difficulty
participating in conversations.
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Challenge 4 Some students may be shy and not
want to talk, while others might want to grab the
floor and dominate the conversation.
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Challenge 5 In large classrooms, noise from
conversation groups may prevent students from
hearing one another.
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Challenge 6 Teachers may not know how to teach
language, model it, and provide sufficient
opportunities for students to practice it.
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Using Questions Effectively

• Using wait time
• Rephrasing questions
• Using a sequence of questions
• Using leveled questions, properly sequenced

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Encouraging Student Response
Students rates of developing fluency and
accuracy are proportional to the rate at which
they respond correctly. Giving students more
opportunities to respond is a way to increase
their rates of learning.
Teachers can increase student opportunities to
respond by

• Using a rapid pacing of instruction
• Allowing choral and multiple responses

Adapted from David Howe 2006
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Individual Responses in Whole Class Discussions
Teachers can maximize student engagement by

• not calling on students with their
• hands raised

• asking a question and then calling on
• all students

• calling on low performers more often

Adapted from David Howe 2006
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Making Connections

• Table Talk
• Describe how teachers can use structured
  conversations to teach specific features of
  language.
• Choose one of the following
• Any five fixed expressions (such as high poverty
  rate)
• Past tense verb endings (verb ed)
• Conditional clauses (with if)
• Explanations with the word because

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Instructional Activities

• Used in structured conversations

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Close Reading

• Close-Reading Questions
• What is the author trying to say here?
• What do you think the author wants us to know?
• What is the author talking about?
• So what does the author mean right here?

• Does that make sense with what the author told us
  before?
• How does that fit in with what the author told
  us?
• But does the author tell us why?
• Why do you think the author tells us that now?

From Carol Jago, 2005.
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Descriptions
Teachers can ask students to describe something
they have read about. For example, teachers can
ask students to describe characters. They can
give their students lists of words and
expressions the students might use.
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Three-Step Interview
Description  The Three Step Interview is a
cooperative structure that helps students
personalize their learning and listen to and
appreciate the ideas and thinking of others. 
Active listening and paraphrasing by the
interviewer develops understanding and empathy
for the thinking of the interviewee.
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Three-Step Interview
1.     Students work in pairs.  One is the
interviewer, the other is the interviewee.  The
interviewer listens actively to the comments and
thoughts of the interviewee, paraphrasing key
points and significant details. 2.     Student
pairs reverse roles, repeating the interview
process. 3.     Each pair then joins another pair
to form groups of four.  Students introduce their
pair partner and share what the partner had to
say about the topic at hand.
Use word banks and sentence starters to ensure
language development.
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Three-Step Interview On Healthy Foods

• Our Favorite Foods
• Pizza
• Ice cream
• Tacos
• Pears
• Pasta
• Cake

I think an apple is healthy because
Healthy foods are foods that
My favorite food is I like to eat
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Converting Informal Language into Formal
Language.
Teachers can ask students to convert informal
language into formal language with a partner
before asking students to discuss the
Characteristics of informal and formal language
in small group conversations.
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Conversations with Literature Logs

• Teachers can ask students to share their
  literature logs or their journal entries.

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Discussions about Words

• Teachers can lead whole class conversations
• about words.
• See Beck et al. (Bringing Words to Life)
• Splendid Which of these would be splendid?
• A dirty sock
• A sunny day in the park
• Your own bicycle
• A rainy day

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Discussions about Words

• They can ask students to generate examples
• Tell about something you would be reluctant to
  do. Try to use reluctant when you tell about it.
• You could start by saying something like. I am
  reluctant to ___
• They can have students answer questions/give
  reasons
• Why am I reluctant to eat a new food?
• Why is a child reluctant to come here?
• Show me how a reluctant broccoli eater would
  look.
• They can then get students to use the word in
  more extended interactions. Describe three
  things you are reluctant to do. I am reluctant
  to . . . Swim in the ocean when it is cold . . .

From Beck et al. Bringing Words to Life.
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From Beck et al.

• Which of these would astound you?
• a monkey driving a car
• a homework assignment to do 10 problems in math
• a magic trick by a friend
• a clock on the wall

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Conversational Strategies
Request information
Keep the conversation going
RespondTo Ideas Think While SpeakingCommunicate
When Things Dont Make Sense
Guess judiciously
Use visuals
Rely on others for help
Use pause fillers
Ask questions request clarification
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Oral Language Development

• Teacher comments to prompt student language use
  (See handout.)

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Sentence Stems

• Vocabulary
• In creating a sentence stem, the teacher normally
  provides the beginning of a sentence. The
  sentence starter should be carefully constructed
  so the students show their level of knowledge of
  a word by the way in which they complete it.
• Sample stems include
• Dad got mad when I upset the paints because ...
• When he leaned back in his chair...
• My mom will panic if...

Adapted from Vocabulary Instruction for English
Language Learners Educator's Voice - April 21,
2008  by Katie Kurjakovic?United Federation of
Teachers, New York City.
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Sentence Stems

• Sentence starters can also be used to teach
  grammar.
• Modal Auxiliaries
• I may
• I should
• I must
• I might not
• I could not
• If sentences
• If I were the president/teacher/principal, I
  would
• If I had one million dollars, I would

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Sentence Stems
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Sentence Stems

• Adapted from Content-Area Conversations by
  Douglas Fisher, Nancy Frey and Carol Rothenberg.
  LAS Links http//www.ascd.org/publications/books/
  108035/chapters/Procedures_for_Classroom_Talk.aspx
  
• See also Zwiers, J. (2008). Building academic
  language Essential practices for content
  classrooms. San Francisco Jossey-Bass.

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For Discussion

• With a partner or in small groups, discuss these
  questions
• From your own experience, which oral activities
  do you feel are the most effective? Share your
  favorites.
• Which activities do you feel might be helpful in
  motivating students to use new language in their
  interactions?

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Structured conversations make a difference!