Give One, Get One

This "Give One-Get One" is an activity designed to tap into and build students' background knowledge.  It's originally from Kagan (1997)--here are the steps:

1.  Generate a topic idea (related to the text to be studied, the topic to be researched or discussed, etc.)

2. Have students fold a piece of paper in half horizontally and number 1-4 above the fold ("Ideas I will give", 5-8 below ("Ideas I got").

3.  Give students a few minutes (short) to write down 4 ideas related to the topic you generated.

4. Have students circulate and exchange their ideas for at at least three-four different ideas (from 3-4 different students).  These new ideas go on lines 5-8.  The students need to write the student's name after the new idea they got. 

5.  After several minutes (be careful not to spend too much time--they'll lose focus), the students can share out in small groups or as a whole group the ideas they got from others.  

6.  Discuss responses, then introduce the text/topic, etc.