This study examined the effects of teaching student teachers specific verbal skills through "explaining," a procedure involving more than lecturing. Another group had explaining as well as peer teaching. A control group had neither. Fifteen-minute tapes were made of the teachers leading a small group discussion which explored a concept, both before and after the course. These tapes were analyzed for percentage of student and teacher talk time, indirect to direct ratio of teacher talk, percentage of accepting verbal behavior of students, percentage of questioning verbal behavior of student teachers, percentage of factual questions asked by student teachers, and percent of pupil questions. Student teachers who had had peer teaching as well as explaining improved in accepting verbal behavior and in questioning verbal behavior. While these teachers asked fewer questions, the quality of the questions improved. Students with only the explaining lessons had also improved by the second tape. They asked more and better questions, and demonstrated more accepting responses than the control group. The results are interpreted to support competency based teacher education programs which set out to teach preservice teachers specific skills. (CD)