I’ve written several blogs about Think Pair Share in the past, because I think it’s such an important teaching routine for teachers to master:
- The ‘Washing Hands’ of Learning: Think Pair Share
- Think, Pair, Share Forensics.
However, doing this well isn’t massively challenging but it does require some thought. During my many lesson observations, I frequently listen in to hear what students are actually saying after they’ve been set off to talk to their partners and, to be honest, I often feel that with a few tweaks to the routine, they’d have done a lot better. Quite often an excellent question with rich discussion is there for the taking but the teacher then uses the all-too-common short-cut: ‘OK everyone, have a chat on your tables.. what do you think about X?‘. And that’s the instruction.
But ‘have a chat about X’, despite its ubiquity, is just not a reliably good basis for paired discussion that supports all students to think, to speak, to rehearse and to learn more. Teachers can’t listen to every set of pairs talking at once so, unless they set it up well in advance, students can exchange all kinds of silliness and shallowness without the teacher noticing.
