‘Save the last word’ is is a useful oracy structure for students to become familiar with. It can be used for purposeful talk across the curriculum – it really gets them listening to each other.

Put students into trios and have them number themselves 1, 2, and 3.
Ask a purposeful open question, such as Which line in the poem most surprises you? or Which method do you prefer for solving this problem?
Student 3 answers the question but does not say their reasons.
Students 1 and 2 then both give their thoughts about what Student 3’s reasons might be.
Student 3 gets ‘the last word’ – they explain their reasons, saying whether or not the other two made correct guesses.

Example:

A World War One trench - mud, debris, soldiers on duty or sleeping — Image by WikiImages from Pixabay

Teacher: From what we’ve studied so far, which aspect of World War One do you think is the most interesting?
Student 3: The trenches.
Student 1: Hmm… Maybe you picked the trenches because they were just really brutal – mud, rats, freezing cold… and how soldiers had to live like that for months on end. And some people died there.
Student 2: Or, maybe it’s because trench warfare made the fighting really slow and dragged everything out.
Student 3: Yes, I was thinking mainly about how bad the conditions were – always being wet, cold, and cramped, and having to cope with diseases and constant danger. I can’t imagine having to endure that. Remember that Wilfred Owen poem we read? And, yes, it’s also interesting how the trenches made the war feel stuck. Neither side could really win or move forward properly for a long time.