In honor of National Speaking Week, (May 16-22), I am co-hosting this week’s #TeachWriting chat about the power of speaking assignments. The Twitter chat takes place on Tuesday, May 17, 2016 at 9pm EST/6pm PST. Speaking and listening standards have become the forgotten part of the Common Core. Despite the huge premium employers place on these skills, almost no testing consortia, states, districts, or schools are formally assessing them and too many teachers avoid speaking and listening assignments altogether.

Chat Questions:
:07 Q1 List some of your favorite orators and include links to speech(es)/TED Talks you use in your class.
:14 Q2 What do great speakers do? What are the essential elements for speaking well?
:21 Q3 How impressive are your students in speaking assignments? What are their weaknesses?
:28 Q4 @Erik_Palmer says We assign speaking, but we don’t teach speaking. What should Ts start with first?
:35 Q5 How do you approach discussion-based activities in your class? Include your grade & subject.
:42 Q6 What are your favorite student speaking assignments? Why were they successful?
:49 Q7 What are your favorite tech tools for recording, practicing & sharing speaking projects?
:55 Q8 How do you accommodate the introverts who would rather die than speak in front of their peers?

In June, Erik Palmer, Corbin Moore and I will launch a free MOOC on Teaching Speaking & Listening. The class is open to teachers of all K-12 subjects. Here are a few resources to get you started: Listening & Speaking Demystified. A framework for teachers including more speaking assignments in their instruction. Effective Speaking  Pop Up Debates. Look what’s Number 1. Here’s the archive of the chat.