Accountable-Talk Ball Discussion Activity

Video Transcript
Mrs. Balash- 5th Grade ELA
In order to maximize discussions after activities, accountable-talk was
put in place to insure that students listen to each other. Before they
can share response, answer, connection, comment, or question; they
must restate or rephrase what the student before them shared. I found
this discussion technique produced richer conversation between my
students. They also needed to become more specific with evidence as
the next student may ask them to repeat or clarify their statement.

1st Video- Room 1 3:01 total minutes early practice in

accountable-talk
Discussion on the Theme of Pinkys Promise.
Students worked through rephrasing other students, if they can bring
in extra information, and throwing the ball overhand/underhand.
*Several connections of theme to other books [text-to-text]

2nd Video- Room 2 7:41 total minutes early practice in

accountable-talk
Discussion on the Theme of Pinkys Promise.
Students worked through rephrasing other students, if they can bring
in extra information, and throwing the ball overhand/underhand.

3rd Video- 2:23 total minutes

Main Idea Activity in response to Hurricane Katrina
Students color-coded article, Hurricane Katrina. Objective was to
notice the topic, topic sentence, and supporting details that build the
main idea. Students color-coded independently after modeled colorcoding for a You-Tube article. Accountable-talk ball discussion
activity was employed to share students work and discuss how we
built the main idea of the entire passage.
Student 1: I mean um, in Louisiana, because there was 1,836 people
who died and 1,577 of them were in Louisiana. Student 2
Student 2: He was saying how, the main idea, the problem. Can you
repeat it, Student 1?
Student 1: That um, that Hurricane Katrina mainly occurred in
Louisiana.

Student 2 He was saying that Hurricane Katrina mainly occurred in

Louisiana. But and the topic sentence, I think would be Hurricane
Katrina was the costliest and deadliest natural disaster in recent United
States history. [quoted from text] Um, um, Student 3.
Student 3: Can you repeat the sentence.
Student 2: I said that the topic sentence was, Hurricane Katrina was
the costliest and deadliest natural disaster in recent United States
history.
Student 3: He said that the topic sentence was that Hurricane was
the worst in history. And I think that the main idea of the story, which I
got from right out the text. And I, I think it was, But the read cost of
this hurricane came in the form of lives lost.
Student 4: Um, she said that the main idea was with the cost of
peoples lives. And I dont think it was the most deadliest hurricane
because I was with my mom and she said there was a lot of rain
because it was another. It was like Hurricane Patricia. And I dont
remember what category it was but
I stopped recording this portion of the discussion to allow a few more
students close the discussion. But then Student 1 requested to look
up Hurricane Sandy on the ipad after Student 1 made a connection to
Student 4s statement about different hurricanes. Student 5 brought
up Hurricane Sandy and this allowed more students to connect to the
discussion, further research, and understanding the vast impact of a
hurricane.
Main Idea Activity in response to Hurricane Katrina
Students color-coded article, Hurricane Katrina. Objective was to
notice the topic, topic sentence, and supporting details that build the
main idea. During discussion, there was a spontaneous request from
Student 1. After he grabbed an ipad, other students followed suit and
looked up further information to discussion and article. Student 1
looked up how high the waters raised due to the flooding. Other
students researched images of the water in New York and the tunnel.
Spontaneous request- look up information on ipads in response to
discussion.
Student 5: Hurricane Katrina, and the kids, he um, everybody was on
the roof and he fell off the roof. He was um, he had to hand onto a
tree. And then he found um a kid, and there was this dog. And the dog

was in his house. He and the dog were in the house and they survived.
And they met his parents.
Student 1: Um I looked up, Student 5 said he read an I Survived book
and everybody was on a roof and it fell off and then his dog and then
he, they had to hide. And then he and his dog survived and then they
met their parents. And I looked up on a ipad how high the water got for
hurricane Sandy. It got to 13.88 feet high. Um Student 6,
[Another student displays ipad for Student 1- images of water rising in
New York tunnel]
Student 6: Um, he says looked how high the hurricane was and um, I
have a connection that isnt a hurricane very strong winds and
rainstorms, then one time I was out. My mom and dad were driving
somewhere, I forget where, and there were really hard winds and the
rain fell and then there were very hard rains. And I think we were
getting it from somewhere else. Student 3
Student 3: Um Student 6 said that, his parents were driving
somewhere and that there were um very rough winds and rain. And he
said that he thought it was from another hurricane somewhere else. I
have a connection with this, not what he said but with Hurricane
Katrina. I dont know how true this is, but when I went on vacation this
summer, somebody told me that there was a tornado in Pennsylvania.

5th Video Room 1 11:04 minutes- first time asking all

students to stand and face speaker. 14 of 28 participated
in discussion, all standing and participated in end
video demo.
Informational Sources ELA Week 11
Students interacted with the BWSD website or app on ipads. After
some time identifying text features and understanding layout, we
began a class discussion on the text features and the students
responses to them on the apps.
Mrs. Balash: Through our website, and we were noticing the text
features in there. Our I Can Statement is that I can analyze how a
website or app employs different text features to make it more easily
understood. Okay. So what I want you to talk about is what you and
your group noticed. And how did it make it better or more easily
understood? Student 1, you can start us off.

Student 1: Um I noticed how there was a sidebar and there was like
many of them so like different subjects. If you wanted to go to a school,
you could go to schools like Whitehall or stuff like that. So its faster
and you dont have to search for everything. Student 2.
Student 2: Um she was talking about different sidebars and stuff. And
what me and my group was talking about was we went on the lunch
menu and we saw there was tables, and charts and footnotes. Um,
Student 3.
Student 3: She was talking about like footnotes and the lunch. Um, I
noticed, there were just like pictures right at the beginning whenever
you just tapped on it. It was like a slide (in audible.)
Student 4: My group noticed there was like a lot of bold print. Like if
you were to click on some one of the one something like students or
the lunch then you would see bold print about other topics about that
certain topic.
Student 5: When my group, went on, we, I noticed that when we there
like different headings and we saw headings. Like it said like lunch
menus and tapped on it and then it would say this or would you want
to go to this or would you want to go to this. [Student 3 reminds
Student 5 to repeat Student 4] She said that umpaused and threw
the ball.
Student 6: So me and my group, we were, we were all looking like all
the pictures, our school, and also people that were trying to start
things like doing bag pipes and all this. And also we saw how people
were doing basketball games for charity events like Malala Fund. And
also I wanted to athletics and I saw that it said all this stuff like how
varsity and freshmen play there. And also you can see their schedules.
And also it was like bold print because it was trying to tell you what it
was, it was the title. And also you can go into students part, you could
get signed in. Like this is what I realized whenever I was at home
instead of online like today, so if you want to go to the school, it will
have bold print, and the title and italics.
Student 7: He said that there were italics and title and headings that
you can go onto skyward. And I noticed that whenever we were
looking at stuff there was a lot of bold print.. And there were areas
where you could click on something and then stuff could come down
like different schools would come down for you to click on. And there
were a lot of headings and also whenever we would scroll down farther,
I saw there were different ads, and I saw there were pictures of the

school that if you would go onto a different school. There would be

pictures on there of the stuff at that school. Student 8.
Student 8: Student 7 talked about how there was a lot of bold print
and ads and stuff. I kept noticing there were a lot of ads and
advertisement. There was a lot of bold print in those ads.
Student 9: He said there was a lot of adsI figured out that there was
a paragraph at the top. It was explaining to you what the schools do
and what they do to help each other. Student 10.
Student 10: You said there was a paragraph explaining what the
schools did. We saw a bunch of links to websites, that were
highlighted.
Student 11: Um he was talking about how he found stuff that was
highlighted. Um, when my group and I looked at the calendar and the
school lunch menu, we found footnotes that led us onto google.
Google where we can sign in to the schools website. Well first we
looked at a bunch of bullets points, but we saw a sidebar at the side of
the website thingy. And we saw there were calendars for the schools
so you can look on other schools websites. Student 3.
Student 3: She was talking about how she saw where you could sign
into stuff. And I saw some pictures of teachers and activities. Student
7
Student 7: He said he saw pictures and activities. And I was just
looking at the ipad and Student 12 was scrolling down and I saw at the
bottom it had the weather on it. It said like how many degrees it was.
[Student 12 holds ipad so Student 7 can refer back to his noticing] The
next three days what the temperature was now and how there was a
chance of rain. And I thought it was pretty weird since it was a
Baldwin-Whitehall website. Student 5
Student 5: Um, he said that he saw weather down at the bottom and
when Student 3 was looking at the ipad, we went to the actual website.
[camera panned to another student interacting with ipads on website.
Student 13 was analyzing a picture of students with certificates in front
of a bulletin board]
Student 5 Continued: We scrolled down and it says what happening in
December. So it says like today theres going to be a choir concert and
theres going to be a band concert for tomorrow and like whats
happening on special days.

Student 14: Um, could you repeat what you just said.
Student 5: Um, when Student 3 was on the ipad it tells you like whats
happening through December. So the band concert is going to be
tomorrow and the choir concert is going to be tonight.
Some of the rephrasing seems to help students edit their
comments into clearing statements for the rest of the class.*
Student 14: Um, I saw different pictures of kids doing activities at the
high school, middle school, and elementary schools. And I saw the title
of the website with the BW School logo on all the schools.
Student 12: Um she said that she saw kids doing activities for those
schools. And if you go on every single school, like if you press the
schools tab. If you go on every single one, [Student 12 demonstrates
his directions/comments on ipad as he speaks], theres pretty much a
picture on the top on or in the middle for every school. So that was
just cool that I saw that.
Student 1: Um can you repeat that?
Student 12: Um if you go on every school, there was pretty much a
picture on the top or in the middle or bottom somewhere of the
school.
Student 12: He was talking about if you go on every single school tab,
there was a picture of the students. And I noticed there was a
translator because like our country is home to all different kinds of
cultures, so like if your family talks a different language and you need
something important that it can translate for you.
Student 6: Also like I was just looking at the ipad with Student 15 and
Student 1. And I was noticing about the ads like how Student 8 said.
Like theres educational ads instead of games and all that. Theres
CCAC. Education and all this stuff and you can go to college at CCAC.

6th Video- Room 1 1:56 minutes- students found video on

bwsd website and brought skill directly to students on text
features from informational sources.
[many students are sitting because we were about to wrap up
discussion, but spontaneous moment began and I began recording

with previous student, students are also filling out Student Object SelfRating Exit Slips]
Student 6: Whenever its an advertisement, it say P-A school lunches
and whenever you press the Ad, you can go over the school lunches for
Baldwin and Paynter. And also you can get other Pennsylvania school
meals like if were having meatballs or if were having pizza. And also I
thought that it was just really fascinating to think about. All I knew was
where you get those papers for the school lunch.
Student 16: Um, we were watching the video about the pep talk for
students and teachers. And we were laughing.
Mrs. Balash: Now was this something you found on Baldwins website?

Student 16: Mmm hmm.

Mrs. Balash: Very cool.
[Students crowd around ipad to actively watch Kid President pep talk
for teachers and students.]

7th Video- Room 2 10:33 minutes- first time asking all

students to stand and face speaker. 20 of 23 students
participated in discussion.
All students stood at beginning, as discussion went on, students sat
down after they shared. This class is less likely to join into the
conversation as Room 1. Some students who seem shy or avoid
discussion. This activity is worthwhile in bringing them out of their shell
as they feel more comfortable with standing and talking. Requiring all
students to stand and look at the speaker was a nice suggestion for
engagement of all of the students. Room 2 also needed some
intervention from teacher to pull discussion from identifying text
features into talking about the application or benefit of those features.
The students did a nice job sharing the features they noticed with their
group.
Student 1: I saw a lot of photographs and (in audible)
Student 2: You could see a lot of bullet points, oh wait I was supposed
to repeat what she said. You could see a lot of pictures and you could
see a lot of bullet points, I guess. [this student rarely volunteers to
share in discussion].

Student 3: you see a lot of bold print and stuff like that and you said
about the bullet points.
Student 4: Um he said theres a lot of bullet points. And what I found,
I think on the Whitehall and uh school link and it shows you whats
going on Whitehall Elementary School. The sound of the seasons. Like
it shows you what is going on.
Student 5: Um she said she sees a lot of. I forget what she said, but
something about pictures and bullet points, and whats going on. And I
saw headings
Student 6: Um well we found, she was talking about headings and I
saw some charts if you guys look. Well we click on this button and we
found like a million charts. What guys, whats underhand again? I
dont want to owe MVP Money
Student 3: like this (bowling)
Student 7: Um can you repeat what you said, I couldnt really hear
you.
Student 6: Um, so we found charts. Like there were charts.
Student 7: Okay so Student 6 said that her and her group found like a
bunch of charts. I wanted to say like I dont know if they count as
sidebars, but there were a bunch of links.
Mrs. Balash: There were.
Student 7: That go on the side of the app, those are kind of sidebars,
so I found a lot of sidebards. Um, Student 8, because I like the face he
is giving me.
Student 8: He said the sidebars and um well heres like the title at the
top it says Whitehall Elementary school like news, and pictures, and
headings. [Student 9 demonstrates on ipad as Student 8 explains].
Student 9: Um he said there was a title and headings. And theres a
lot of sub headings up here like links you can go to.
Student 10: Um she said they found a lot of headings. And we found
a lot of little buttons that tell you what things are. Like news,
calendars, and menus, athletics

Mrs. Balash: Now were doing a lot of identifying. I love that we

found all of these nice, text features. Lets start focusing on how did it
make it either easier to understand or how did it help the website?
Why did they use those features?
Student 11: I wanted to say there were a bunch of different colors, like
Christmas colors, like red and green. Yeah theres a lot of pictures.
Student 12: Can you repeat what you said, I couldnt hear you.
Student 11: I said there were a bunch of different colors.
Student 12: He said there was a bunch of colors and I found italics in
Harrison Middle School if you look on the side where it says middle
school.
Student 13: He said that they found italics. And you said to say
something about how it helped you, it helps you because it narrows it
down to where you want to go and what you want to do.
Student 14: She said it helps you because it tells you what you want
to do and where you want to go. Pictures really help to give like an
image of what the person looked like.
[Student not standing, hits ball out of path]
Mrs. Balash: Student 7, remember we never ever do that, okay.
Thats a tally
Student 15: He said there were pictures help show the images and
stuff. And up here if we look at the bottom, then we can see theres
maps. And the school, we can press the school to see. [Student 10
holds ipad up to help Student 15s explanation].
Student 16: She said theres maps and stuff. And I found some useful
stuff. And theres stuff about the sing along and concerts that were
having. That helps me because Im in one of those. And it shows you
the AR winners and everything thats happening. Isnt that amazing. I
had a question about this, but why is there the weather?
Student 17:What she said is about like you said the concerts and stuff
so that can help her because shes in it. Theres a lot of bold print in
there and that can help me by attracting me to the words.
Student 1: Bold print because it attracted him to the words. And I
have a answer to Student 16s question about why there might be

weather. Because if its really going to be snowing, maybe under it,

maybe it will say theres no school today.
Classmate [ohhhhh]
Student 18: Alright she was saying how it would say on the website
that if were snowing really hard it would say if it would be a no school
day or half day. And what I wanted to say was that in the BaldwinWhitehall website, what I saw was basically bold print, everywhere I
looked.
Mrs. Balash: And what do you think that helps?
Student 18: It gets you to notice it.
Student 19: Um he said that he saw a lot of bold print and it helps you
notice it. And I just want to say that I saw a lot of captions. And
captions help explain the pictures.
Student 20: Um Student 19 said he saw a lot of captions and the
captions help you explain the pictures. And then I saw like contact info
like for the school, which would make it easier to call the school.
Student 14: What Student 20 said that she found a lot of contact
information. And theres a lot of links in the website so that helps go
where I want to go.
Student 9: He said there were a lot links on the website.
Mrs. Balash: Student 7, head up, please.
Student 9: And if you um, go into the website, theres something you
can go into each school. And it shows you all five schools: Baldwin
high school, Harrison, McAnnulty, Paynter and Whitehall. And um if
you click on Whitehall, it shows you the schools phone number and
attendance line so that says there a problem, you can go into the
website to see if theres a problem.
Student 8: And she said like website. Well what I saw when you click
events [demonstrates on ipad] theres a calendar so you know what
day things start.