Disciplinary Discussion Cards

Powerful questions organized by subject area to get students thinking and talking about text.

Lesson Snapshots: See the Discussion Cards in Action!

• Introducing the Jigsaw Structure with Focus Questions from the Discussion Cards - Mr. Kinney English 10
• How to get Started Using the Cards in Science
• How to get Started Using the Cards in the Arts

Access the Discussion Cards Below

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Feel free to download and make modifications as necessary.

How the discussion cards help students "build the field."

"Building the Field" is Stage 1 of the Teaching and Learning Cycle, a scaffolded process for English Learners where students build deep content knowledge through language rich experiences. Because this stage more often than not involves a lot of exploration of the topic through rich text-based discussion, the Disciplinary Discussion Cards were developed. The questions on the cards are designed to support learning from complex text - a reputable source that students read, view or listen to that offers the reader important information or a new perspective. Teachers and students can choose a question (or an extremely limited number of questions) from the Discussion Cards for many purposes such as to:

• Set a purpose for an initial read or re-read of a text, annotate the text accordingly, then discuss.
• Explore or inquire into the topic more deeply through structured interaction (e.g. think/ink/pair share, reciprocal reading, jigsaw, socratic seminar, online discussion boards, chalk-talk, etc).
• Reflect on what they are learning through writing, learning logs or journals, or more formal constructed response writing.

These Questions Are For All Students

Regardless of English language proficiency or other learner designation, we believe that, with the right support, all students can learn disciplinary content through complex text. Examples of differentiated supports to ensure access to the content and to equitable participation in the discussion include:

• Scaffolding through: modeling, bridging, contextualizing, schema building, text representation, and developing metacognition.
• Comprehension Strategies such as: clarifying, predicting, summarizing, and questioning.
• Language Supports such as: leveled questioning and differentiated sentence starters
• Conversation routines such as those found in Academic Conversations (Zwiers and Crawford), and Making Thinking Visible (Richhart)
• Conversation structures such as: Save the Last Word for Me, Reciprocal Reading, Think/Ink/Pair Share, Socratic Seminar
• Differentiation Strategies such as: grouping students flexibly and strategically, introducing key concepts with visual or brief text, shorting the length of the required reading for emerging language learners, and providing multiple ways to demonstrate learning and understanding in speaking and in writing both digitally and in person.

Additional Sources to Promote a Positive Classroom Climate

No tool can promote high-quality academic discourse in the absence of a posivite classroom climate where students are expected to take risks, push on each other's thinking, seek out alternative viewpoints, and learn to work independently and collaboratively.

• Make what it means to successfully participate in a text-based discussion clear by using the "Criteria for Participating in Text-Based Discussions" and "Peer and Self Assessment Sentence Starters" on our Assessment Tools Page.
• Promote the "Ground Rules for Civil Discourse" from historian Michelle Tiedje's blog and take time with students to reflect on thier importance.
• Establish a common language for learning with your students by infusing descriptions from the Fundamentals of Learning into your instruction. See West Ed's Center for Standards and Assessment Implementation website.