[guavamama]

I'm currently teaching conversation to first-year university students in China. As is the norm in the China, the classes are huge and the book leaves much to be desired. Since I have such large classes, I would LOVE to have whole-class discussions, except I cannot get my students to talk in class.

After a warm-up and a lesson, I propose the topic for discussion. As a class, I have us generate a list on the board of helpful words related to the topic to help them along in their small group discussions. After that, I break them up into smaller groups where they have really great discussions about the topic. But as soon as we all come together again to talk about the topic as a whole, they clam up and it turns into a Q&A style thing with me asking the questions that they answer. I don't want this to happen and I've been racking my brain to find a solution. Any tips on how I can transition the small group discussions into an organic larger discussion?