Text Chats
Overview
Bringing students' every day literacy practice of texting into the classroom provides regular, low-stakes practice communicating with authentic audiences. In chats about what they are reading and studying, students can practice Foundational Writing Skills, including choosing Syntax and Vocabulary for specific audiences. Through the chats they receive, they also see models of how others convey ideas through writing.
Example: Use This Strategy in the Classroom
Learn different ways to use texting in the classroom, such as re-creating dialogue from a piece of literature in everyday language. Texting can also be used to give students time to think about their answers, increasing positive Emotion and bringing more students into discussions.
Design It into Your Product
Videos are chosen as examples of strategies in action. These choices are not endorsements of the products or evidence of use of research to develop the feature.
See how to set up discussion forums in Google Classroom that allow students to see others' responses and write back, increasing Motivation. Using this free tool, teachers can easily integrate both synchronous and asynchronous written interaction into their students' writing practice.
Additional Resources
Additional examples, research, and professional development. These resources are possible representations of this strategy, not endorsements.
Factors Supported by this Strategy
More Cooperative Learning Strategies
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When peers are able to work together to plan, draft, edit, and revise their compositions, their writing quality improves.
Flexible grouping is a classroom practice that temporarily places students together in given groups to work together, with the purpose of achieving a given learning goal or activity.
As students walk through stations working in small groups, the social and physical nature of the learning supports deeper understanding.
As students work with and process information by discussing, organizing, and sharing it together, they deepen their understanding.
When students explain to others, they deepen their understanding and gain confidence in their learning.
Respectful redirection, or error correction, outlines a clear and concise way that educators can provide feedback on behaviors that need immediate correction, in a positive manner.
Students develop literacy skills by listening to and speaking with others in informal ways.
Writing conferences allow students to share, reflect on, and receive feedback about their writing, which promotes Motivation for revising.
