Are you using the activity turn and talk in your Spanish class?
Turn and talks are one of the easiest activities to incorporate into your Spanish class.
You may find that you’ve tried it and are feeling underwhelmed with the results or maybe your students are bored of the activity and you’re at a loss. No worries- keep reading for ideas on making your turn and talks FUN in your Spanish class.
What is a Turn and Talk?
Let’s back it up…what exactly is a turn and talk?
It’s exactly what it sounds like. Your students have a prompt, and then they turn to a partner and talk.
Easy breezy.
However, like anything if you do this activity often your students may get bored of the same thing over and over and let’s face it…the last thing we want is bored students!
Before throwing in the towel on the turn and talks in Spanish class, let’s make sure you are setting yourself up for success…
Are you giving clear directions?
I know that we are all crunched for time. We have SO much to cover and always feel like we are playing the catch-up game. I find myself guilty of this which means that I sometimes rush through things.
I am SO guilty of rushing through directions. I am a quick thinker and responder so sometimes i give directions, ask if everyone gets it and move on. This is not great (but I’m working on it!)
To slow down and give better directions you have to do three things:
- Post your directions on the board
Like me, so many of our students are visual learners. A simple line of directions will go a long way for them. This also works for the student who wasn’t listening to a word you said and can read the board.
- Model an example
This serves two purposes- first, I am showing my students what I expect of them. This will help me get better answers from them. I can model how I want an elaborate answer with details instead of just saying “give details” and they say “porque es importante”. Secondly, when I call on one student to model the activity, everyone is suddenly paying attention because they see that they may be called on next.
- Walk around and engage with students
Once you give the directions it’s super important to be involved in the activity. I know we have a million things to do and the first five minutes of class is the perfect time to take attendance but if your students see that you are unengaged they will be unengaged (especially the first few times you do this). You want to walk around, talk with them, jump into different conversations and ask questions. This is NOT the time for grammar corrections. This is a time to simply listen, get to know your students, and have some fun.
Now…how do we keep this one awesome activity that we want to do all the time engaging over and over again?
Making subtle changes to HOW you do the activity will go a long way. The activity should be the same (talking about some sort of prompt), but the way that you have students do the activity can be different.
You can try any of these variations:
- Switch up the prompts- instead of always posting a question, try posting a picture that your students can discuss or a fun, yet controversial, statement (for example: Justin Beiber is the best singer of all time). Try to make it something that will engage them through their interests. It doesn’t always HAVE to be connected to your curriculum, it is more to get them comfortable with speaking Spanish.
- Change up the partners- talking to the same partner every time can get a little boring. This can also create classroom management issues because students get a little too comfortable and start to go off task. Keep them on their toes with new partners. It’s also a great opportunity for them to practice with classmates of different ability levels.
- Make the questions engaging- Make sure that the question is something that your students will WANT to talk about. Pop culture references are always great for this. You can also talk about something happening in your school’s community like Homecoming or Prom- this creates instant engagement and also makes students feel like you are doing something that is relevant to their real life.
Turn and talks are essentially a great way to build in interpersonal speaking practice into your daily or weekly lessons. You do not have to do turn and talks every day but just think about how great it would be for your students to be having authentic conversations in Spanish at least 3-4 times per week?
And I know I mentioned it above but they are super low prep! Sometimes I even think of the prompt as I am walking to class. You just need a simple question, statement, or image. When writing your question, make sure it is open ended and leaves room for discussion.
This is especially important in my IB and AP classes where students need to elaborate on their answers with details. To help myself (and my students) this year, I created a resource with over 200 turn and talk prompts that are ready to go. If you want to check that out, click here!
If you want to take your turn and talks to the next level you should think about incorporating a Socratic Seminar into your class. Turn and talks are a great stepping stone to build up your students to a longer and more meaningful discussion that they will have in a Socratic Seminar. You can learn more about Socratic Seminars here or add your info below to grab a free guide on setting up Socratic Seminars in your classes.
