Discussion

Prep Strategy

Caileigh Grant
TE 804 2/9/2018
The Strategy
● 11 AP Language and Composition class
○ This semester we get to focus on argument.
● How to generate deeper more productive conversation both in small groups
and in whole class discussion.

● Quick-writes: before asking students to share their thoughts, give them time to
figure out what their thoughts are on paper. This serves as a kind of rough draft
for thinking and permits students to more carefully articulate their thoughts
before sharing.
The Story
● Explanation of the Quick-write
● The concept of writing in order to figure out what they think was not an idea
that was familiar to my students.
● Handful of students in each hour struggling to get anything down.
● Writing to think directly at odds with AP timed writing (demands writer to
know what they’ll write beforehand)
● With practice (after 3rd time), students became more comfortable with the
concept and nearly every student will generate something on their paper.
● The conversation that follows has benefitted as it is more thought through and
generally prepared.
Materials & Procedure
● I like to use this strategy as the first thing done that day to jump start
conversation
● I’ve found that it helps to have the question that I want students to address
already written down and visible to students so my transitions into this activity
goes smoothly (or so tardy students can still see it if they come in after I’ve
explained it.
● The time given for the quick-write varies on the question. Sometimes, the
questions I thought would be take students less time actually turn out to
generate more writing.
In Steps
1. Recap whatever it is that you want your students to recall or use their prior
knowledge to think about
2. Transition to the quick-write prompt or question (should be written down
before class to streamline transition)
3. Ask students to pull out a piece of lined paper and take a few minutes to
generate the quick-write.
4. Depending on what the schedule for the day is like, the time allotted for the
quick-write can be flexible.
5. Ask students to share their quick-writes with their partner or their table groups
before coming together in large group discussion.
Reflection
I like this strategy because it serves as a foundation to begin the process of
“unlearning” what it means to write while also preparing student thoughts for
conversation.

I’m not sure how far students have yet gone in this “unlearning” process but I think
the elevated conversation as a result of thinking about it beforehand and having
every student already have done the preliminary thinking has propelled student
learning.

I haven’t been collecting these quick-writes because I’ve generally been more
interested in the subsequent conversations but I could collect them as formative
assessments and assessing student thoughts prior to conversation.