My First Freebie!!

I don't know about you, but I just LOVE a good ol' think-pair-share. However, I prefer to call it "Turn & Talk." It's the phrase my mentor teacher used & I just think it's easier to say. The phrase isn't my original idea, so please don't think I'm taking credit for it. If you know where it comes from, please tell me so I can give them due credit!

I love that this strategy allows the students to share and collaborate, and I love the way it enhances their speaking and listening skills. The new Common Core seems to be so reflection/analysis/explanation driven, and I think that students need more opportunities than ever to verbalize and explain their thinking to peers, as well as adults.

Anyway... many of my little ones have trouble following directions, or just remembering procedures in general, so I decided to create these to use as a sort of anchor chart during the summer school math workshop I'll be running. The first page details the procedure of a "Turn & Talk" and the second page has sentence starter prompts to help facilitate discussions between partners and when they share with the group.

In case you aren't familiar with the think-pair-share/turn & talk... the procedure basically goes like this:
1. Students think about the question/task silently. (This time could also be used to write down their thoughts, jot down ideas for a story, etc.)

2. Here's where the sentence prompts come in... when you give them the cue, the students turn to their partners (which I like to give every 2-4 weeks) and quietly discuss their ideas. Face-to-face interaction is best, and specifying 6-inch voices helps keep the noise-level bearable & to make sure they're focused on each other.

3. When you give the cue, you'll come back together as a group and you ask a few students to share what they talked about with their partner. You may want ask a specific question, ask students to tell what their partner shared, choose volunteers, or draw sticks/cards to select students. It's up to you.

Since the documents are small, I plan on having a mini lesson on the procedure of a high quality "Turn & Talk," it's purpose, etc., prior to hanging them up near our group time area where I plan to have most of our discussions

I printed the documents on white cardstock (you could probably also use a lighter color), matted it onto some colored construction paper, and laminated it.

Click HERE to download this freebie!