Spicewood Elementary School In alignment with teaching the whole child, students at Spicewood work on a variety of skills to give them the tools they need to be successful [read more about Approaches to Learning] in our ever changing and connected world. Explicitly teaching and giving students opportunities to practice specific communication skills provides them with vital skills for collaboration.
Communication Skills include:
- listening
- speaking
- reading
- writing
- viewing
- presenting
- non-verbal communication
So what does this look like in the classroom?
Teachers provide their students a variety of learning opportunities and collaboration experiences to develop these skills.
- Students in 2nd grade are currently learning about sound. To launch their inquiry, students looked at a list of a variety of objects (ex: clapping hands, balloon popping, dog barking) and were asked to collaboratively work with one another to sort the objects.
- In 4th grade, students are exploring fractions (comparing, equivalent, etc.). Students were given two fractions to compare to one another. Independently, students solved the problem and then were asked to work with an elbow buddy to discuss their answers as well as share strategies they used to solve the problem.
As group members and partners shared their ideas, they used speaking and listening skills to discuss and share their ideas. Students were given sentence stems (such as, “I agree with you because…, and I’d like to add…” or “I disagree with you because…, and I think….”) to help support and guide the academic conversation with their peers. Teachers highlight these skills with explicit instruction and modeling, in addition to reflection time with their students allowing the classes to see the value and importance of these skills.
What can you do at home?
- Model communication skills (listening, speaking, non-verbal communication) at home with your child
- Learn more about thinking and communication skills from the lens of a PYP student
- See what this type of communication might look like in a PYP classroom