Elbow Exchange & Sort

Build a culture of caring

Practice listening skills

Practice academic vocabulary needed for reading and writing tasks

Assess current thinking

Share and develop ideas, questions, and knowledge. Scaffolding this routine by starting with Dialogue Lines may be necessary if know your students don’t have strong conversation skills. Elbow Exchange and Sort

Integrating This Into Your Lessons

Students are assigned the role of listener or speaker, taking turns to exchange their thinking (answer, question, opinion, observation). Then the pair sorts the thinking (prioritize, compare, sequence, or summarize).