Encouraging Encouraging Effective Peer Effective Peer ConferencingConferencing

Encouraging Encouraging Effective Peer Effective Peer ConferencingConferencing

Things to Think About Things to Think About Aija Simmons Aija Simmons

msaija30@gmail.commsaija30@gmail.com

Time• Initially conferences go quickly however as

students get used to talking and have longer drafts time will need to be adjusted

• Block out a long enough time from the beginning to accommodate longer conferences

• Mini lesson or model/ conferencing/ debrief• Shorten the mini lesson and debrief as

students get better

Time Keeping• Train students to use a self monitoring

system for conferences• Allow students to decide when to

change partners• Provide training for what partners

should do when they finish conferencing before the other students

• Immediate revision is encouraged

Practice• It takes time (lots of it)• Students will need encouragement not to give

up• It is helpful to join conferences with a short

piece of your own writing • Training on interviewing or talk show hosting

during occasional community building activities are helpful

• Playing talk show and hosting an author who just published a book is a fun way to get students to practice engaging in conversation about another classmate’s writing

Community• Think early about the kind of writing

community you desire• Build in opportunities across the curriculum

that will support the kind of discourse you would like to see during conferencing

• Initially it may be helpful for students to choose their own conferencing partner it eases tension around sharing and critique

• Encourage sharing and talking throughout every stage of the writing

Posture• Set up very clear procedures for what

materials students should have and how you expect their bodies to look during conferencing

• Knee to knee/ face to face/ elbow to elbow etc

• Procedure for determining who goes first

Modeling• Teacher led one on one• Teacher led whole class w debrief• Teacher as student • Students fish bowl

Mini lesson Ideas• How to get my partner to elaborate• The information of a question• What do I do with the positive comment• How do I ask a question about my own writing…what

do I want to know• Add more detail….Is that helpful• What if I don’t get the point • If were just talking about the event and not the

writing are we on task• Do we have to use these words• A reader’s eye ……..

Accountability• Students need some form of

accountability • Students turn in conference sheets

along with drafts and pre-writes• A simple conferencing rubric for

self monitoring may also be helpful