Teaching Sequence

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

10 minutes

Tune In: Defining a man

25 minutes

Find Out: Silent conversations

15 minutes

Take Action: Group discussion

10 minutes

Reflection

Tune In: Defining a man

Step 1

Play this video:

Man to Man - Stop the Coward's Punch (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-K7jNu-mE8)

Step 2

Direct students to the Student Worksheet and ask them to write their answer to the question:

What does it mean to be a man?

Step 3

Ask students to come to the whiteboard and write some of the keywords they used in their definitions. Alternatively, use an online resource like www.padlet.com or www.mentimeter.com for students to enter their definitions anonymously for the rest of the class to see. You could read out some of the words/definitions, finding any points of consensus and where thinking diverges.

Find Out: Silent conversations

Note: This activity uses silent writing as a method for students to explore a topic in depth. Asking students to write out their responses to a stimulus slows down students’ thinking and encourages them to consider the ideas of their peers. It also creates a copy of their thinking that can be displayed or used later. This strategy is beneficial for students who are less confident to speak in class and those usually eager to share, as the latter are encouraged to listen and consider their classmates’ ideas. The more you can run activities like this in your classroom, the more confident and skilled your students become in this method.

Step 1

Separate students into pairs or groups of three. Explain to the class that they will be having a written conversation, in silence. They will have time to speak in pairs and groups later.

Hot tip: Make sure you provide the opportunity for questions prior to beginning the activity so that there are no questions during the activity.

Step 2

Give each group one of the A3 Prompt Materials and ensure they have something to write with. You could suggest each student in the group uses a different colour pen or marker to show the back and forth of the conversation.

Step 3

Provide students time to study their allocated text or image in silence. When they are ready, they are to comment on the text and ask questions of their partner through writing only - the classroom should be silent. While they should start on the topic of the prompt material, the conversation may wander and students are encouraged to explore whatever ideas are interesting to them. If someone asks a question, their partner or group should attempt a reply. Students may like to draw lines or highlight to connect ideas and more than one person can be writing at the same time. This step should run for around 15 minutes.

Step 4

Maintaining a silent classroom, ask students to now leave their groups and walk around the classroom to read the other annotated texts. They should bring their markers with them and add their own comments or questions as they move around.

Take Action: Group discussion

Step 1

Return students to their initial A3 page and ask them to verbally discuss the new comments or questions that were added by their peers, as well as the ideas they read in the annotations of their classmates.

Step 2

Ask students to note down a question or comment that stands out to them in the space allocated on their Student Worksheet.

Reflection

As a class, debrief about the process of the silent conversation. You can start by asking students what they learned from the process and use student responses to delve a bit deeper into the ideas they engaged with - especially the question or comment they chose to note down. It might be that the conversation focuses on how tricky it can be to stay silent for such an extended period and how students may have felt uncomfortable. Alternatively, some students may have found this activity relatively familiar due to their comfort with communicating online.

Differentiated Learning

Students could be grouped by ability and have A3 Prompt Materials allocated according to their strengths - text-based, prompt-based, or visual-based.
An alternative option for printing the prompts onto A3 is printing them smaller and placing students into larger circle groups. Provide each student with one piece of material and give them a couple of minutes to annotate and ask questions before they pass their piece of paper to the left, receiving a new one from the right. This process continues until all students have read and annotated all the materials.

Extension -

Students could take the ideas developed through the silent conversation and their nominated question or comment from the end of the group discussion and develop this out to an extended piece of writing. This writing could be expository, creative or persuasive in nature and would provide students with the chance to explore the ideas they engaged with in this lesson more independently, building on the ideas of their peers.

Coward Punch - Silent Conversations

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