I am always searching for ways to encourage my students to be active and involved in the lesson; I aim for all to be engaged in the discussion. A whole-class discussion usually means a few students contributing, directing most of the comments to the teacher ping pong style. Even if the teacher decides to hear every group member, it can only ever be a short statement because of time limitations.
I follow and deeply admire Jennifer Gonzales, a teacher blogger at Cult of Pedagogy. A few years ago, Gonzales wrote a post on ‘chat stations’, a teaching strategy that resonated with me, and I adopted it immediately. The simple idea involves writing questions for discussion, printing or writing each question on a separate piece of paper and hanging them around the classroom. In groups of 2-4, the students move from station to station, stopping to chat for a designated time. Gonzales suggests that groups record their responses to the questions on a collaborative sheet, but I usually prefer not to.
I have used chat stations with elementary school classes, teachers in in-service workshops, and pre-service teacher students. This strategy always works and can be adapted to any topic, group or time framework. I have used the stations as a lesson opener, a means of summing up a subject, a pre-reading strategy, and very often as a pre-writing warm-up. The chat stations allow for movement and a break in the classroom routine. They encourage all students to contribute their thoughts and to receive feedback from peers. As the teacher, I am free to walk around, observe, and move between the groups. I see my students performing independently, and I can listen on the side or participate as necessary. If there is a group displaying difficulty, I can accompany them from station to station. In fifteen minutes in the stations, all students can express themselves several times, and the direction of the conversation is unique in each small group. Sometimes we return to the whole group to sum up, or continue the discussion, but I feel it is unnecessary on others.
When teaching moved online last year, I decided to explore ways to incorporate chat stations in my synchronous lessons on Zoom. I understood that the crucial movement element would be lost, but I wanted to devote time to significant peer conversation involving all students. I decided to try to generate the experience of chat stations using breakout rooms.
In my ‘Literacy: L1 teaching didactics’ course, I taught a unit on teaching literature in elementary school classes. Before we read a short story, I identified the two main themes of the story, peer pressure and competition. I wrote questions inviting students to share their personal experiences and their opinions. Some questions were general: ‘What is peer pressure?’ or ‘How can teachers respond to negative peer pressure in the classroom?’ and other questions were more personal: ‘Do you experience competition in your studies in the college?’ or ‘Share a memory of a time peer pressure influenced you’. I showed a slide with the questions and asked the students to photograph the screen with their phones. I then divided the group into groups of three and instructed them to talk about the first question for five minutes. I emphasised that all members of the group should take part in the conversation. After five minutes, I closed the breakout rooms and brought all the participants back to the centre. Without further discussion, I explained that we were moving on to the second question in the same groups, again for five minutes. This continued until all the questions had been covered. Closing the breakout rooms between the questions helped the students progress to the next question and focus on a new topic each time. In this activity, I decided to occasionally visit the breakout rooms and listen quietly to the discussion; I did not interrupt. The atmosphere was relaxed in all of the rooms, all cameras were on, and the students were listening intently to each other.
Returning from the groups, I introduced the short story we were about to read and connected the themes discussed in the breakout rooms with the text.
In my ‘Dialogue and Thought’ course for EFL pre-service teachers, I used chat stations as a pre-writing strategy before my students wrote autobiographical narratives about language learning. In this case, I presented each question separately before entry into the breakout rooms. I wanted the class to hear many voices and experiences in the time available; therefore, the groups were mixed for each question. Reflecting on the pedagogical affordances of the chat stations, students remarked that they appreciated having time to think and talk with their peers. They felt they that were listened to and had encountered many ideas they could incorporate into their writing. Many participants valued the stress-free, low stakes atmosphere and the chance to get to know others in the group despite the online context.
In elementary language and literacy classes, chat stations are a powerful addition to lessons focusing on spoken language. Teachers can address particular speaking and listening skills, give specific instructions (‘this time the listeners must wait until the speaker has finished before commenting or asking questions’, for example), and allow for collaborative and individual reflection following conversation in the stations.
Teachers interested in introducing chat stations into their classrooms, virtual or physical, should be prepared to release control and allow students to lead the conversations. As a teacher, you will not hear and experience everything that happens in the groups, which may be frustrating for educators used to standing centre stage at all times.
I highly recommend using chat stations in face-to-face and online classes. They can also be used in hybrid teaching, dividing the students in the physical classroom into small groups and dividing the online students into breakout rooms. Teachers can adapt the idea to any content they are teaching and to the nature of the group. In my experience, the strategy can be used repeatedly, and there is never a sense of boredom.
Have you used chat stations in your teaching? I would love to hear about your experience.
