We
know that sentence stems are a support for English Language Learners, but I’ve
realized they are helpful in all kinds of situations. For example, this week, I shared some
sentence stems with my son and his wife, who are going to kindergarten
parent-teacher conferences for the first time. (Can you tell me more about…..? We are trying to figure out why……). I also shared with my student teachers
sentence stems they can keep in mind during writing conferences. While doing so, it struck me how many of
these writing conference prompts I have adopted into my coaching
repertoire. Questions that I ask when
conferring with young writers are also useful in coaching contexts. And these sentence stems and questions can be
useful when I wasn’t part of the planning process or wasn’t there for the
lesson. For example:
Planning conference:
·
I
don't understand…
·
Tell
me more about that.
·
How
could you find out more about that?
·
Where
is this (lesson) taking you?
·
What
do you like best in this (lesson)?
·
What's
the most important thing you're wanting your (students) to understand?
·
How
will the beginning bring your (students) right into the lesson?
·
Is
all of this important? What parts don't you need?
·
What
could you use more help with?
·
What
questions do you have of me?
Reflecting conference:
·
Tell
me more about that.
·
Tell
me again about that part.
·
I
don't understand…
·
What
was your favorite part? How can you
build on it?
·
What
was your least favorite part? How might you change it?
·
Why
is this significant?
·
What
will happen next?
·
What
could you use more help with?
·
What
questions do you have of me?
Notice
that some questions work in both planning and reflecting conferences. Those are my favorites. (Less to remember!) J
Maybe
those years of sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with young writers have paid off in
unexpected ways! If you have experience
teaching writers workshop, consider how your strengths in that arena can add to
your coaching repertoire.
This week, you might want to
take a look at:
Word choice that supports teacher collaboration:
Student handout with sentence stems for
peer discussions:
Ideas for holding Mock Newberry Awards:
Play is important – and mixing up the
kinds of play kids do is important, too:
Using infographics and CCSS:
That’s it for this week. Happy Coaching!
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