Protocols are systems used to engage students in intentional talk. The person who is talking is the one who is learning. Using protocols also increases the levels of engagement for every student.
Join me in a workshop to learn how to use protocols with your students.
What is the book that you keep coming back to? What is the text you use in your classroom over and over again no matter what level you teach because it resonates with you and your students?
If you teach a class that isn’t reading or language arts based is there a text that you refer to because it’s just one you love?
I have a friend who loved a book in third grade so much she stole it from her library. She still has it — in fact she ran to her classroom excitedly to come show me the book after workshop at one time.
If you were attending my workshop in real life after you signed in and picked up your workshop point page you would write this text on an index card. We will be using it in just a few minutes.
The secret for some of these actions to work is you must do something with them. Students are more likely to participate and engage if they know their efforts are not wasted.
I’m just not having you arbitrarily write down a book because I want to add it to my Amazon list. We are going to talk about it and make connections.
Now let’s come to the back of the room and form a circle — it may be more of an oval because of how the class is arranged. Please bring your index card with you. We are going to do something called Crew. We are all crew, not passengers. Everyone has a job. We stand in a circle because everyone is equal, there are no sides, and everyone can see each other.
We will introduce ourselves and tell everyone where we teach and then the rest of the group will greet us by name. When you do this with students it is important to use names. There are several students I am sure you can think of that never hear their names in a positive tone throughout the day. Crew builds the culture and the shared accountability in the classroom. It’s important for them to hear their name in a loving supportive way from the teacher and from their fellow crew members..
Crew is made up of three parts — greeting, reading, and closing. Now we are ready for the reading part.
Can someone please give voice to the quote on the screen —
“Reading is essential for those who seek to rise above the ordinary.” — Jim Rohn
Can someone else please give voice to the quote?
For our crew today everyone brought their index card with them which is your Admit Ticket. Now I’m going to have you combine your work from the Admit Ticket protocol with a protocol called Back-to-Back Face-to-Face.
You’re going to share what you wrote on your card and make a connection to the quote we just read about reading.
Back-to-Back Face-to-Face is a protocol where two students find a partner and stand back-to-back. This allows students to have thinking time for what they’re going to say when it is time to share with their partner. Teachers can have students put a thumb up on their chest when they are done thinking so the teacher has a visual clue that everyone is ready. Then the teacher says “face-to-face” and students turn and share. This can be a one-time share or you can have students find another partner and go back to back and face to face and share again to get another perspective.
Tea Party
The next protocol we’re going to move to is called Tea Party. This protocol was created by Kylene Beers. It takes a little more preparation than the protocols we have practiced so far.
I selected an article for you to read. It was cut apart in an intentional way.
Each student gets a piece of the article and independently reads it. On the back of their excerpt or on a separate piece of paper the student writes a prediction of what they think the article is about in a complete sentence.
Then students get in groups. Today I chose groups of three. Within the group share and compare text and predictions.
Then each student receives a copy of the article and reads it independently. Here annotation can be helpful.
Now each individual student finishes the sentence stem of
I used to think ….now I know….
using their first written predictions and their new information learned from the reading.
Back to the same groups and share these statement and formulate a group statement using the same sentence stem. Share out will be the group statement of predictions and new learning.
I particularly like the tea party protocol because it allows students to practice the idea of predicting and then changing their prediction based on new information.
It also allows for individual accountability for the reading and then a group accountability because the group works on writing their own statement
Boxing
The next protocol we’re going to use as one of my new favorites. You will receive a large poster paper for each group. Please draw the boxes to prepare.
You will read the first page only of the article you just received. As a group please log your thoughts about what you already know about the topic and what you want to learn.
Now as a group decide how you want to read the rest of the article — everyone reads it all, or you may chunk it up. After reading, log quotes and new learning in the middle box on your poster.
After your new learning then log a summary within the center box. It can be a picture, a phrase or just one word.
This protocol is one where there’s lots of room for variation for digging in deeper to a worthy text. You can use it for poetry analysis where each group does a chunk of the poetry and digs in deeper to each stanza.
A gallery walk can then be done where each group moves from poster to poster reading their classmates work to learn of everyone’s insights.
Closing
Let’s circle up again in the back of the room. We are going to go around one last time. I would like you to share one word from today that sums up how you are feeling, what you learned, or maybe what your next action is.
Thanks for attending the workshop today!
Tammy L. Breitweiser is a curriculum coach in Northwest Indiana where she is currently dedicated to impacting student achievement in grades 3–6. With more than 24 years of experience, she is a reading advocate who believes reading is the gateway. She is working on a collection of short stories. You can connect with Tammy on Twitter (@tlbreit)or You can sign up for her newsletter here.
