STRATEGY FOCUS
Circle the Sage
PURPOSE
This Academic Dialogue strategy provides students with the opportunity to share what they know with other students. The students (sages) who are knowledgeable and comfortable sharing about a given topic spread about the space and the small groups of other students circle around to ask questions, listen, and take notes to enhance and deepen their understanding of a topic.
PROCESS
- Poll the group or predetermine students who are knowledgeable and comfortable sharing about a given topic (sages).
- Spread the sages around the classroom space.
- Divide the remaining students evenly among the sages.
- Instruct the sages to share what they know while listeners ask questions and take notes.
- Ask the listeners to return to their seats or table groups and share findings.
PROBING QUESTIONS
CONSIDERATIONS
- Why were you selected to share with the group?
- What did you learn through this process?
- What is the value of learning from your peers?
- Students don’t have to be experts; they might just have information to share.
- Give students sentence stems to use when first practicing this strategy until they can formulate their own questions.
- Consider what notetaking structures may need to be put into place for the listeners, especially during the first attempts of using this strategy.
- Remind students to thank the sages for sharing with them.
- Keep group sizes to a minimum of 3-5 students.
CONTENT APPLICATIONS
ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS
Students who have a strong grasp of writing serve as peer mentors to answer questions and provide feedback to other students.
HEALTH & PHYSICAL EDUCATION
Students on a basketball team teach others how to dribble the ball.
SOCIAL STUDIES
Review student written responses to a question and identify those students or “sages” who demonstrate a strong grasp of the learning to share what they know.
SCIENCE
Students investigate the structure and function of a protein in the human body. Then they share what they know about these proteins with other students to help them explain how differences in a protein’s structure affects its function.
MATHEMATICS
Students demonstrate how to correctly solve an equation.
VISUAL & PERFORMING ARTS
Lead instrumentalists demonstrate to the others in their section how to play a certain section of the music.
CAREER & TECHNICAL EDUCATION
Students identify areas of strength, and lead focus groups on different cooking techniques. Modeling the skill and offering targeted feedback to help others develop their capacity.
WORLD LANGUAGES
Students choose a favorite movie, TV show, book, or concert and prepare a short description. The “sage” shares information about their selection, then the other students have an opportunity to ask follow-up questions about the topic.
Sources
eMints. (2004). Cooperative Learning. Retrieved on July 20, 2011 from http://edtech.kennesaw.edu/intech/cooperativelearning.htm
Adapted from Spencer Kagan: Cooperative Learning