%0 Journal Article
%T Quality Talk: Developing Students¡¯ Discourse to Promote High
%A Brendan D. Hendrick
%A Carla M. Firetto
%A Cristin Montalbano
%A Jeffrey A. Greene
%A Liwei Wei
%A Mengyi Li
%A P. Karen Murphy
%J American Educational Research Journal
%@ 1935-1011
%D 2018
%R 10.3102/0002831218771303
%X Students often struggle to comprehend complex text. In response, we conducted an initial, year-long study of Quality Talk, a teacher-facilitated, small-group discussion approach designed to enhance students¡¯ basic and high-level comprehension, in two fourth-grade classrooms. Specifically, teachers delivered instructional mini-lessons on discourse elements (e.g., questioning or argumentation) and conducted weekly text-based discussions in their language arts classes. Analysis of the videorecorded discussions showed decreases in teacher-initiated discourse elements, indicating a release of responsibility to students, whereas students¡¯ discourse reflected increased critical-analytic thinking (e.g., elaborated explanations or exploratory talk). Importantly, statistically and practically significant increases were evidenced on written measures of students¡¯ basic and high-level comprehension, indicating the promise of small-group discourse as a way to foster individual student learning outcomes
%K argumentation
%K classroom discussion
%K critical thinking
%K Quality Talk
%K reading comprehension
%U https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.3102/0002831218771303