What: Provide all students access to rigorous content. Common language across content areas allow students to make connections and build literacy skills so they can approach the content with confidence.  

Directions: Instructional Steps + Checklist  

Templates/Resources: 

• Creating an Rich Environment for Academic Language Resource

• List of scripts for middle school

• List of scripts for high school

Scaffolds: These are essentially the basis of many different AVID and WICOR strategies. You can provide them early and often until students build up confidence and more academic language.  

What: Done in pairs, students get a chance to share their prior knowledge of a topic and record any new knowledge they learn from their partner. This can also be used for students to summarize sections of information and share with another student that had a different section of information.  

Directions: 

1. Allow students a few minutes to fill in the left column of their paper with anything they already know about the topic

2. Assign partners or have students find a partner 

3. One partner takes 30 seconds to share what they wrote while the other listens.  Sentence stem: “I am an expert on this topic because I know…”

4. After 30 seconds is up, the listening partner summarizes what they heard.  Sentence stem: “According to you…”

5. Reverse roles and repeat steps 3 & 4.

6. When finished, students go back to their seats and write down any new knowledge they learned.  Option to also write down anything agreed on too.

7. Ask students to share out what they learned from their partner.  Sentence Stems: “I learned from (partner’s name) that…”   OR “(partner’s name) and I both said…”

Templates/Resources: 

• Template

Scaffolds: 

• Provide a short expert source: focused notes, a short reading or video clip, a teacher-provided mini-summary

• Limit the content scope: one concept, term, or process only

• Highlight or bold key ideas students should focus on

• Allow a single slide or document with keywords (not full sentences)

• Provide a 30-second outline:

• 10 sec: Define the topic

• 10 sec: Key details or example

• 10 sec: Why it matters

Offer a spoken planning frame:

• “This topic is about…”

• “One important detail is…”

• “This matters because…”

What: Discussion techniques allows students to be actively engaged as they move between thinking about different ideas or questions. They work together in small groups to share ideas and respond to meaningful questions, documents, images, problem-solving situations or texts. 

Directions: Instructional steps  

Templates/Resources: 

• Slide Deck 

Scaffolds: 

• Use one prompt per station, keep prompts short and focused

  1. 1. What do you know about ___?

     2. Why does ___ matter?

     3. What questions do you have about ___?

• 1–2 minutes of silent thinking before rotating

• Write one idea you are ready to share

• Norms: read before you write, do not erase others’ ideas, add a new idea or build on an existing one, finish your thought before rotating

• Mindset: ideas do not have to be perfect, his is a thinking draft, all contributions matter

What: Are student-led and student-centered study groups where students can deepen their understanding or problem solve with other students through socratic inquiry. CSGs can be used in any content area class and can be used for test or concept review. 

Directions: overview and instructional steps 

Templates/Resources: 

• CSG Prework Template (pdf)

• Written reflection guide (pdf)

Scaffolds: 

• Purpose statement (posted or read aloud):

  1. • “The goal of this study group is to help each other understand ___.”

• Time chunks with visible timers (e.g., 3 min think → 5 min share → 2 min summarize)

• One focus question at a time (avoid multi-step confusion)

• Provide a short menu of scripts aligned to study groups:

  1. • “I think the answer is ___ because ___. 

     • “Can you explain how you got that?”

     • “I’d like to add on…”

     • “I’m not sure yet, but I think…”

     • “Let’s check our notes/text.”

• Scaffold through prompts:

  1. • “Who can summarize what your group has so far?”

     • “What evidence are you using?”

     • “What’s one question your group is stuck on?”

What: Are essential to teaching students the components of effective collaboration. Group roles promote positive and productive collaboration, on-task behavior, equitable work, task analysis, leadership, and conflict management. Students will gain the skills to work effectively in groups later on, but need the support of assigned and defined roles to help them be successful. 

Directions: 

Assigning each student a role helps students stay engaged and on task while working as a group. It is also an equity strategy that equalizes status in group work.

To help communicate group roles and responsibilities during group work, you can use these templates.

You can make your own copy (File → Make a copy), modify text and images,

and digital tents, and/or individual role cards. See the last slide for a blank template. 

Templates/Resources: 

• Role Descriptions

Scaffolds: 

• Preselect roles based on students' strengths until confidence is built 

• Verbally coach students which role should be active on each task

• Build in personal reflections on how well students did their roles 

What: Heart and Brain Feedback is a way to give helpful feedback to classmates. Heart feedback focuses on strengths and encouragement. Brain feedback focuses on thinking, clarity, and ways to improve. Both types of feedback help us grow as learners. 

Directions: 

1. Listen carefully as your classmate shares their work or idea.

2. While listening, think about two things:

   • One strength you noticed (Heart).

   • One question or suggestion that could help them improve (Brain).

3. When it is your turn to give feedback, share your heart and brain comment. Use kind, respectful language and focus on the work, not the person.

4. If typing feedback in the chat or a shared document: label your comments as Heart or Brain.

Templates/Resources: 

• Visual

Scaffolds: 

• Model examples: model one Heart comment and one Brain comment aloud, name why each comment fits that category.

• Sentence starters for Heart feedback:

  1. I like how you…

  2. One strength I noticed is…

  3. This part was engaging because…

  4. You did a good job of…

  5. I can tell you worked hard on…

• Sentence starters for Brain feedback:

  1. One thing to clarify is…

  2. A question I still have is…

  3. You could make this stronger by…

  4. I was confused when…

  5. Have you considered adding…

• Limit the amount of feedback:

  1. Require 1 Heart comment and 1 Brain comment only.

  2. This prevents overload and keeps feedback focused.

• Anchor to criteria:

  1. Provide a checklist, rubric, or success criteria.

  2. Brain feedback must connect to the criteria or task goal.

• Low-risk practice: 

  1. Practice with a sample or anonymous work first.

  2. Allow students to draft feedback before sharing it.

What: A format for classroom discussion and an activity that can be used in almost any classroom setting. The format is most similar to a debate, but students focus on dialogue that develops students’ abilities to carefully pay attention to their peers and engage in constructive dialogue regarding an issue with two opposing sides.  

Directions: Instructional steps 

Templates/Resources: 

• Digital notebook page/Google Slide

Scaffolds: 

• Clear claim and options, provide a debatable statement with no right answer and define positions clearly: agree, disagree, undecided or listening/thinking.

• Individual thinking before choosing a side, provide 1–3 minutes of silent think time, students write their initial position, one reason, and one question.

• Norms for respectful discourse: listen without interrupting, respond to ideas, not people, use evidence or examples, it is okay to change your mind.

• Academic language scripts:

  1. • I agree with the statement because…

     • I respectfully disagree because…

     • I would like to build on what ___ said…

     • My evidence comes from…

     • I am changing my position because…

• Speaking structure: one speaker at a time, use a talking piece or hand-raise, paraphrase before responding using: What I heard you say was…

• Evidence support: allow access to notes, texts, or data, use evidence sentence starters such as: According to… or An example from the text is…

• Support for undecided students: allow students to ask clarifying questions, allow students to summarize arguments from both sides, sentence starters include: one argument I hear is… or a question I still have is…

• Movement with purpose, students may switch sides at any time, require a reason for switching such as: I changed my position because…

• Gradual release: early rounds include heavy scripting and structure, later rounds include fewer sentence starters and more student-led dialogue.

What: A great way to get students to engage in dialogue and conversation about a text/ topic that provides structure so that all students can be successful. This strategy is a formal discussion, based on a text, in which the leader asks open-ended questions. Within the context of the discussion, students listen closely to the comments of others, thinking critically for themselves, and articulate their own thoughts and their responses to the thoughts of others. 

Directions:

• Overview

• Video overview

Templates/Resources: 

• Resources and some templates

• Student questions during the seminar

Scaffolds: 

• Preparation with the text: students annotate or take notes before the seminar, students identify at least one quote, one question, and one idea to bring to discussion.

• Discussion norms: 

  1. • Listen to understand, not to respond.

     • Refer to the text when speaking.

     • Build on others’ ideas rather than debate them.

     • Allow wait time and silence for thinking.

• Academic language scripts:

  1. • According to the text…

     • On page ___, it says…

     • I would like to build on ___’s idea…

     • Can you explain what you mean by…

     • I see this differently because the text shows…

• Questioning emphasis:

  1. • Students ask open-ended questions rather than make claims.

     • Examples include:

       1. Why do you think the author…

       2. What might this mean when it says…

       3. How does this connect to earlier in the text?

• Speaking structure:

  1. • Students speak multiple times briefly rather than once at length.

     • Paraphrasing or summarizing before responding is encouraged.

• Support for quieter or hesitant students:

  1. • Provide discussion trackers or goal sheets.

     • Allow students to enter the discussion by asking a question rather than making a claim.

     • Sentence starters are visible throughout the seminar.

• Reflection after seminar with question prompts:

  1. • One idea that deepened my understanding was…

     • A question I am still thinking about is…

     • One way I contributed to the seminar was…