Academic Conversations
Academic Conversations are sustained, structured paired or small-group talk routines in which students build and deepen ideas about content using disciplinary language. As developed by Zwiers and Crawford (2011), they center on five transferable conversation skills: elaborating and clarifying, supporting ideas with evidence, building on and/or challenging a partner's ideas, paraphrasing, and synthesizing. Unlike a quick turn-and-talk, an academic conversation asks two or more students to stay on one idea and co-construct understanding across several exchanges, scaffolded by sentence stems, prompts, and a visual conversation guide. The goal is to develop academic discourse (speaking and listening) and content reasoning at the same time.
How it’s typically applied
- 1Choose a content-worthy, open prompt that has more than one defensible response (for example, a comparison, an interpretation, or a should/should-not question) so students have a genuine reason to elaborate, support, and negotiate ideas.
- 2Explicitly teach one conversation skill at a time. Model elaborating and clarifying, supporting with evidence, building on or challenging, paraphrasing, and synthesizing using a think-aloud and a visual conversation guide that names and shows each skill.
- 3Post a bank of sentence stems for each skill (for example, 'Can you say more about...', 'My evidence for that is...', 'I see it differently because...', 'So what you are saying is...', 'To put our ideas together...') and keep it visible during the talk.
- 4Pair students intentionally and give each partner a clear role or stance, then set the goal of building one idea before moving on rather than trading quick answers.
- 5Have students converse while you listen, take notes, and coach into the talk, redirecting with prompts ('What is your evidence?', 'How does that build on what your partner said?') instead of supplying the content yourself.
- 6Close with synthesis: partners summarize the idea they co-constructed, then share out, write a short reflection, or transfer the talk into writing so oral reasoning feeds literacy.
- 7Have students reflect on the conversation itself using a simple rubric or peer feedback, set a goal for their next conversation, and over time take ownership of the skills.
Why it works for emergent bilingual students
Academic Conversations are a strong fit for emergent bilingual students because they create low-anxiety, high-frequency opportunities to produce extended, meaning-focused talk. Swain (1985) argues that comprehensible input alone is insufficient for full second language development, and that producing language pushes learners to notice gaps and make their output more precise. The back-and-forth negotiation built into the routine gives students real communicative reasons to clarify and refine what they say. Because the five skills and the underlying academic reasoning are conceptual, they draw on what Cummins (1979) describes as a common underlying proficiency, so a student who can elaborate, support a claim, or synthesize in Spanish is using cognitive-academic ability that supports the same moves in English. Building on that, teachers can invite translanguaging, letting students plan, clarify, or co-construct ideas in their home language before or alongside English (García & Wei, 2014), which treats their full linguistic repertoire as an asset for rigorous thinking. Structured, meaningful interaction is also a core component of sheltered instruction for multilingual learners (Echevarria et al., 2017).
Adapting it across proficiency levels
Pre-Production
At the earliest, pre-production stage, students participate through high support while their receptive language and academic concepts grow. Pair them with a supportive partner, welcome pointing, gestures, drawings, manipulatives, sorting cards, and one- or two-word or home-language responses, and let them rehearse a single sentence stem with a frame and a word-and-picture bank before speaking. Treat home-language and gesture contributions as full participation; the goal is engagement with the idea and active listening as language emerges.
Beginning
At the Beginning ELPS level, students take short verbal turns using heavily scaffolded language. Provide a small set of posted sentence stems with a visual conversation guide, model the exchange first, and have students practice one skill (often elaborate and clarify or support with evidence) using frames such as 'I think ___ because ___' and 'My evidence is ___.' Allow rehearsal time, partner pre-talk, and translanguaging to plan the idea before sharing it in English.
Intermediate
At the Intermediate ELPS level, students sustain a short exchange and combine two or more skills. Reduce the frames to a posted menu they choose from, expect them to support claims with evidence and build on or paraphrase a partner across two to three turns, and prompt them to stay on one idea before moving on. Coach in real time toward more precise academic vocabulary and connectors (because, however, for example).
High Intermediate / Advanced
At the High Intermediate and Advanced ELPS levels, students hold extended, multi-turn conversations with growing independence. Fade or remove the stems, expect them to challenge and synthesize ideas, cite multiple sources of evidence, negotiate disagreement respectfully, and self-assess with a rubric. These students can lead conversation groups, generate their own prompts, and transfer the oral reasoning into formal academic writing and presentations.
In the classroom
In a 7th-grade science class, the teacher posts the prompt: 'Should our city require homeowners to replace lawns with native plants?' Partners receive a conversation guide with the five skills and stem cards. An emergent bilingual student at the Intermediate level opens with 'I think yes, because native plants need less water,' and her partner uses a build-on stem: 'I agree, and my evidence is that the article said they save 60 percent of water.' The teacher invites the pair to plan their reasoning in Spanish first, then converse in English. As they talk, the teacher listens and prompts, 'Can you challenge that idea? What would someone who disagrees say?' At the end, each pair synthesizes one shared claim with evidence and writes it on a sticky note, which becomes the seed for an argumentative paragraph the next day.
Research basis
Academic Conversations are a defined instructional approach built on five core conversation skills (elaborate and clarify, support with evidence, build on and challenge, paraphrase, synthesize) that develop academic language and critical thinking across content areas.
Zwiers, J., & Crawford, M. (2011). Academic conversations: Classroom talk that fosters critical thinking and content understandings. Stenhouse Publishers. [link]
Comprehensible input alone is insufficient for full second language development; producing language (pushed output) drives learners to notice gaps and make their language more precise.
Swain, M. (1985). Communicative competence: Some roles of comprehensible input and comprehensible output in its development. In S. M. Gass & C. G. Madden (Eds.), Input in second language acquisition (pp. 235-253). Newbury House.
Academic and conceptual abilities developed in one language draw on a common underlying proficiency and transfer across a bilingual student's languages, so reasoning skills practiced in the home language support the same skills in the second language.
Cummins, J. (1979). Cognitive/academic language proficiency, linguistic interdependence, the optimum age question and some other matters. Working Papers on Bilingualism, 19, 121-129. [link]
Drawing on a bilingual student's full linguistic repertoire (translanguaging) validates emergent bilinguals as an asset and supports deeper engagement and learning.
García, O., & Wei, L. (2014). Translanguaging: Language, bilingualism and education. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137385765 [link]
Structured, meaningful interaction among students is a core, research-based component of effective sheltered content instruction for English learners.
Echevarria, J., Vogt, M. E., & Short, D. J. (2017). Making content comprehensible for English learners: The SIOP model (5th ed.). Pearson.
Constructive, structured classroom conversations fortify literacy, language, and content learning for multilingual students by helping them create, clarify, fortify, and negotiate ideas.
Zwiers, J., O'Hara, S., & Pritchard, R. (2014). Conversing to fortify literacy, language, and learning. Voices from the Middle, 22(1), 10-14. [link]
Sources reviewed by an independent second-language-acquisition specialist and an adversarial citation audit.
Ask Verónica about Academic Conversations
Verónica is our AI tutor, and she knows this strategy. Tell her about your classroom, your mix of proficiency levels, or a specific TEKS you are planning to teach, and she will help you put Academic Conversations to work.
These strategies are part of the free ELPS Online Helper. Learn the 2026 ELPS and earn 1 hour of CPE credit.
Explore the free course