Student-Teacher Conference
Description
What Is It?
A student-teacher conference is a one-on-one meeting between a student and a teacher. The most effective conferences ensure that each member is both an expert and learner during the conversation. Both the student and the teacher identify strengths and areas of growth during their discussion and then collaboratively select specific strategies that will support the student's progress. The teacher should model selected strategies and participate in guided practice with the student during the conference.
Why Use It?
This type of meeting helps increase motivation and leads to higher achievement as students use it as an opportunity to build their self-monitoring skills and reflect on their growth and how they can continue to improve.
Student-Teacher conferences are also a great time to build and strengthen relationships and rapport with individual students.
Instructional Steps:
Preparation - Have students complete a pre-conference form to set up their discussion items and questions. Use that information to establish an agenda with the student in advance of the meeting. This will allow your student autonomy in directing some of the conference. Be sure to highlight the student's strengths in the conference in addition to areas for growth.
Scheduling - This can be tricky, but be creative when deciding how conferences will fit into your class schedule. Consider using Centers or Workstations where students are working in groups independently, and having one center or workstation be to meet with you.
During the Conference - Provide students with a note-taking outline, template, or form for reference. Remember, the conference should include some teaching, so students may want to add ideas to their interactive notebooks.
Goal-Setting - Encourage students to set their own goals during the meeting based on the conversation. Document what goals students have set and help them set a timeline for completion. Set up a progress monitoring timeline to check on their progress.
Additional Support - For students who need more support, it may be helpful to have a pre-identified list of areas of growth and possible strategies from which the student can select..
Quick Tips
Check out Workstations or Centers as an idea for how to schedule conferences.
If two-three students need support on the same skill, consider grouping them together periodically for a conference and strategy teach/modeling.
Attempting Conferences for the first time? Consider trying the following:
Research the student and their processes.
Name for the student what they’re already doing well.
Decide on one thing to teach during the conference.
Teach that one tip clearly and have student practice with you.
Work with student to set next steps.
Record the conference notes and next step, confirming the plan with the student.
Conferences should last 3-5 minutes and teachers should meet with each student at least once a week.
Teachers should move around the room so as to not interrupt the flow of the work time.
Holding conferences in the student’s work space also helps to put the onus on the student to be in charge of their work.
Questioning:
While students are engaged in independent work, teachers engage in 3-5 minute conferences with students in students’ work spaces, careful not to take full control nor interrupt students’ work cycle too much.
During conferences, teachers may ask:
To open:
How’s it going?
What are you working on?
To determine your next move:
Could you tell me more about that?
What are your next steps?
To guide the student to try something out:
Have you thought about trying ______?
Does that seem like something that would work for you? If not, what would you like to try?
Great! I am going to move on to my next conference. What are you going to try out now?
Did you know?
Conferences can be used to set goals for academics, behavior, or self-monitoring.
Holding daily short conferences with students is a strategy that supports culturally sustaining pedagogy, reading and writing workshop, and inquiry-based teaching.
Conferences help build independent learners who can reflect on their understanding and their processes and make decisions about how to move their work and learning forward.