InTASC Standard #8: The teacher understands and uses a variety of instructional strategies to encourage learners to
develop deep understanding of content areas and their connections, and to build skills to apply knowledge in meaningful ways.
Peer Interaction Strategies
In early childhood, students learn through imitating peers’ language and “doing” the tasks with students their own age. The emphasis on student directed activities, therefore makes it imperative that I plan and implement strategies that encourage peer interaction. When students work with one another to explore their learning environment and the world around them, they not only build their oral language skills, but also have opportunities to practice socially appropriate skills. Some of the crucial conversational skills that we utilize as adults are taught in Pre-K, such as making eye contact with the speaker, actively listening so that one can respond to what the speaker said, polite disagreement and resolving conflicts through language.
Creating an safe emotional environment also starts with the establishment of strong peer relationships. I want students to feel comfortable admitting “I don’t’ know”, and instead, utilize their resources in their classmates, and seek a solution with a peer. Also, strategic pairings expose students with language deficits to strong models of language and behavior. For a child with a language delay, even repeating and/or imitating that model behavior helps grow their language base. In those situations, the strategy focuses on the development of appropriate social and language skills. The content, therefore, is simply a vehicle to practice expressive language.
Table of Contents
Peanut Butter & Jelly
An important strategy I use to elicit peer conversations is Peanut Butter and Jelly partners. These pairings follow a structure that I taught at the beginning of the year, where each child was assigned the role of either Peanut Butter or Jelly. Assigning roles not only helps me manage free expression but also helps student navigate conversations with their peers in a structured way.
During core instruction, I purposely plan multiple opportunities for students to turn and talk with their partner. During that conversation, each role is given a particular task to perform, or question to answer. While Peanut Butter is talking or counting, Jelly is listening and checking, or matching, and vis versa. Typically, each students gets the opportunity to complete each role, which increases their chances of mastering the skill.
This Peanut Butter and Jelly strategy also allows me to strategically pair students with a partner that compliments their specific needs. When I assign partners, I must consider personality, behavioral challenges, expressive language abilities, as well as the need for paraprofessional support. I often like to pair students with language deficits with more verbal peers, which provides them with a strong peer model prior to their own independent response. This structure also makes it easy to change pairings frequently, and give students an opportunity to build relationships with all members of their class.
This anchor chart is used to reference the language and behavior expectations during PB&J partner talks. It provides descriptors that allow me to tailor my feedback to students who struggle to follow expectations.
Here, two students use the Peanut Butter and Jelly strategy to count a set of objects (1-5) and match it to the corresponding numeral. The student on the left, wearing a Jelly tag, assumes the role of "matching", while his partner, who wears a Peanut Butter tag, is responsible for counting the given set of objects.
The image to the right illustrates visual aids used to guide students' application of this strategy. The jars of Peanut Butter and Jelly are taped behind each student's seat on the rug, which helps define their spatial boundaries, but also reinforces their assigned role.
