5.1 Speaking, Listening & Presenting
Key Takeaways
- Georgia's GSE expect students to engage in collaborative conversations with diverse partners about grade-appropriate topics, confirming understanding by restating and paraphrasing.
- Three high-leverage discussion structures for P-5 are Think-Pair-Share, Literature Circles, and Socratic Seminar; each distributes talk equity and scaffolds evidence-based talk.
- Active listening is taught explicitly: eye contact, nonverbal cues, restating, paraphrasing, and clarifying questions anchor charts make the behaviors visible.
- Speaking skills (volume, pace, eye contact, articulation) and presentation skills (audience awareness, organization, visuals, posture) are coached with rubrics and stems.
- Accountable Talk requires claims to be backed by text evidence, and Bloom's/Socratic questioning moves discussion from Remember to Evaluate and Create.
Speaking, Listening & Presenting in the P-5 Classroom
Georgia's English Language Arts GSE require that students engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions with diverse partners on grade-appropriate topics, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly. The P-5 teacher selects the structure, models the norms, and coaches the talk. Three high-leverage routines appear repeatedly on the GACE:
- Think-Pair-Share — students think individually, discuss with a partner, then share with the class. Best for quick checks of understanding before whole-group discussion; provides wait time for emergent bilinguals and reluctant speakers.
- Literature Circles — small groups read the same text and take on rotating roles (Discussion Director, Word Wizard, Connector, Summarizer, Illustrator). Roles distribute talk equity and deepen comprehension of literature and informational text.
- Socratic Seminar — students sit in a circle and discuss an open-ended "big idea" question about a shared text using evidence. The teacher facilitates but does not lecture; students practice accountable talk and civil disagreement.
Active Listening Behaviors
Listening is not silence. The Georgia standards expect students to confirm understanding of written text read aloud or information presented orally by restating key ideas, asking clarifying questions, and paraphrasing. Coach these discrete behaviors:
- Eye contact with the speaker
- Body stillness and facing the speaker (nonverbal cues)
- Nodding or brief verbal affirmations ("mm-hmm," "I see")
- Restating: "So you're saying that..."
- Paraphrasing: putting the idea in your own words
- Asking clarifying questions: "Can you tell me more about..."
Post anchor charts of sentence stems ("I heard you say...", "I agree, and also...", "I see it differently because...") so students have scaffolds for accountable talk. Model the stems during read-alouds and reciprocal teaching.
Speaking Skills
When students present or respond, coach the four vocal tools:
| Skill | What it looks like in P-5 | Coaching move |
|---|---|---|
| Volume | Loud enough for the back row to hear, without shouting | "Project to the wall behind the last person" |
| Pace | Not too fast, not too slow; pauses at punctuation | "Slow down between ideas; breathe at the period" |
| Eye contact | Looks at different listeners, not at the floor or screen | "Pick three friends in different corners of the room" |
| Articulation | Clear consonants, no mumbling | Tongue-twister warm-ups; record-and-playback |
Presentation Skills for Elementary
A presentation in grades 3-5 might be a book talk, a science findings share, or a small-group research product. Teach the PAVS acronym: Posture (stand tall, feet planted), Audience awareness (look up, not at the screen), Visuals (one idea per slide, large font, images over text), Structure (introduction, body with 2-3 main ideas, conclusion).
Presentation Skills Table
| Component | Grades 1-2 expectation | Grades 3-5 expectation |
|---|---|---|
| Audience awareness | Faces audience, speaks to teacher | Adjusts volume, examples, and tone for peers vs. adults |
| Organization | Beginning, middle, end with picture cues | Introduction with a hook, transitions, conclusion |
| Visuals | One picture or object | Slides or poster with limited text; sources cited |
| Posture | Stands still with teacher support | Stands tall, gestures purposefully, manages nervous movement |
| Delivery | Brief 1-2 minute share | 3-5 minute presentation with eye contact and pace control |
Accountable Talk
Accountable Talk, developed by the University of Pittsburgh's Institute for Learning, is talk that is accountable to the learning community, to knowledge, and to rigorous thinking. Students use stems such as "I agree with ___ because...", "I disagree because the text says...", "Could you explain what you mean by...?" Teachers enforce three norms: (1) talk is about ideas, not people; (2) claims require evidence from the text; (3) disagreement is civil and builds on the previous speaker.
Bloom's Taxonomy Question Levels
Plan questions across the cognitive demand spectrum of Bloom's revised taxonomy so classroom talk does not stall at recall:
- Remember — "What is the capital of Georgia?"
- Understand — "How would you summarize this chapter in one sentence?"
- Apply — "How would you use the rule in a new problem?"
- Analyze — "What causes can you identify in this passage?"
- Evaluate — "Which solution is strongest, and why?"
- Create — "How could we design a better ending?"
On the GACE, a question asking "Which question requires the highest level of thinking?" rewards the Evaluate or Create option over Remember.
Socratic Questioning
Socratic questioning is a disciplined series of questions that probe reasoning. Use these prompt families:
- Clarification — "What do you mean by ___?"
- Assumption — "What are you assuming?"
- Evidence — "What in the text supports that?"
- Perspective — "How might someone who disagrees respond?"
- Implication — "If that's true, what else follows?"
In a Georgia fourth-grade classroom reading a historical fiction text about the Trail of Tears, a teacher might start with "What assumptions does the narrator make about the soldiers?" and follow with "What evidence in the text supports that interpretation?" The questioning sequence moves students from surface comprehension to reasoned interpretation.
A third-grade teacher wants every student to respond to a comprehension question before opening the discussion to the whole class. Which structure best fits this goal?
A student says, "I disagree because the text says the character felt scared." Which Accountable Talk norm is the student demonstrating?
Which question stems at the highest level of Bloom's revised taxonomy?