Learning through Talk

1. Learning through Talk Kay Hancock Melanie Winthrop LEARNING MEDIA

2. Workshop aims • Raise awareness and familiarity with the content of Learning through Talk • Demonstrate coherence between key professional resources • Consider the implications for supporting students’ learning across the curriculum through teaching and use of oral language

3. Language for learning • What is the role of oral language in this lesson? • In particular, look for: • What the teacher does • What the students do

4. We use oral language to: • convey information • organise and plan • build knowledge • develop understandings • express ideas …

5. AND … • define our membership of social groups • build relationships and manage social interactions • express our identity

6. Vision • What we want • for our young people

7. Confident • Positive in their own identity • Connected • Able to relate well to others • Effective users of communication tools • Actively involved • Participants in a range of life contexts • Lifelong learners • Active seekers, users, and creators of knowledge

8. Key competencies • Thinking • “Students … actively seek, use, and create knowledge.” • Using language, symbols, and text • “making meaning of the codes in which knowledge is expressed.” • Managing self • “students seeing themselves as capable learners … They know when to lead, when to follow, and when to act independently” • Relating to others • “… interacting effectively with a diverse range of people in a variety of contexts … the ability to listen actively, recognise different points of view, negotiate, and share ideas” • Participating and contributing • “ … includes a capacity to contribute appropriately as a group member, to make connections with others, and to create opportunities for others in the group”

9. Reading and speakingNEMP 2004 • Vocabulary knowledge is essential to comprehension. Students would benefit from opportunities to develop and expand vocabulary in meaningful contexts. • Students’ abilities to elicit deeper information through explorative questioning requires them to attend carefully to available information … the development of speaking skills needs to be integrated with skills of listening, observation, and thoughtful interpretation. • Students need opportunities across a variety of contexts to develop the skills and confidence needed for voicing and justifying an opinion. They need to learn how to question and consider the opinions of others in appropriate ways.

10. What the teacher does • “It’s what teachers actually do, moment by moment in their classrooms, that makes a difference to student achievement.”

12. Instructional Strategies • Deliberate, goal-directed instruction by the teacher includes: • Modelling • Prompting • Questioning • Giving Feedback • Telling • Explaining • Directing Chapter 4 (Learning Through Talk: MOE 2009)

13. Discussions • Teachers’ support students’ learning before and during discussions by: • Teaching Protocols • Allowing think time • Scaffolding instruction • Encouraging purposeful talk and learning • Monitoring on task learning and talking • Provide feedback Learning through Talk, (Years 4-8) MOE 2009, Page 67 • Learning through Talk (Years 1-3) MOE 2009 Page Page 67

14. Discussions • Explicit teaching helps students to: • Tune in • Take turns • Listen with intent • Remain on the topic • Value each other’s contribution • Negotiate meaning with each other Learning through Talk, Years 1-3, 4-8. MOE 2009 Page 67

15. Building conversations

16. Giving Feedback • Recapping - summarising, retracing, catch up • Revoicing - interpreting and rephrasing • Marking - responding to specific ideas • Turning back - holding speakers accountable • Learning through Talk, (Years 4-8) MOE 2009 Page 55 • Learning through Talk (Years 1-3) MOE 2009 Page 57 • Page 55, Learning through Talk, MOE 2009

17. Scaffolding language, scaffolding learning:Developing mathematical discourse: a case study • Read the case study and discuss and respond to the following questions: • What are the deliberate actions that the teacher uses to explicitly teach the discourse of mathematical argument? • What was the impact of the teaching? Learning through Talk (Years 4-8) MOE 2009 Page 70

18. Scaffolding language, scaffolding learning • View the following clips. • Identify how the teacher supports the students to clarify and build meaning through talk. • Discuss in pairs or groups

19. The role of oral language in the standards

20. The role of oral language in the standard • Read the illustration for the reading standard at the end of Year 6. • Identify the underpinning role of oral language in the reading behaviours. • Discuss the teacher’s role in scaffolding the students’ oral language.

21. Big ideas • Oral language is more than just a strand of the English curriculum. It’s more than speaking and listening. Oral language involves ways of being and thinking. • Oral language is integral to all classroom interactions and to all learning. • Teachers have a crucial role to play in supporting students’ learning and academic success. • In order to become more proficient in oral language, students need many opportunities to talk. • Many aspects of oral language benefit from explicit instruction.