Discussion Strategies - Facing History and Ourselves

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Brainstorming is an effective way to help students get ideas from head to paper. The Alphabet Brainstorm helps structure students’ brainstorming by asking them to generate an idea that begins with each letter of the alphabet. This can be done as an individual, small group, or whole class activity. It is a quick way to generate thoughts, measure prior knowledge, and evaluate learning.

Barometer - Taking a Stand on Controversial Issues Links to an external site.

The barometer teaching strategy helps students share their opinions by lining up along a continuum to represent their point of view.  It is especially useful when trying to discuss an issue about which students have a wide range of opinions.  Engaging in a barometer activity can be an effective pre-writing exercise before an essay assignment because it gets many arguments out on the table. 

This discussion strategy uses writing and silence as tools to help students explore a topic in-depth. Having a written conversation with peers slows down students’ thinking process and gives them an opportunity to focus on the views of others. This strategy also creates a visual record of students’ thoughts and questions that can be referred to later in a course. Using the Big Paper strategy can help engage shy students who are not as likely to participate in a verbal discussion. After using this strategy several times, students’ comfort, confidence, and skill with this method increases.

Understanding the past requires students to develop an awareness of different perspectives. The Café Conversation teaching strategy helps students practice perspective-taking by requiring students to represent a particular point-of-view in a small group discussion.  During a conversation with people representing other backgrounds and experiences, students become more aware of the role many factors play (i.e. social class, occupation, gender, age, etc) in terms of shaping one’s attitudes and perspectives on historical events. Café Conversations can be used as an assessment tool or can prepare students to write an essay about a specific historical event.

If you have introduced a writing prompt that students will revisit throughout a unit of study, you might have students use an evidence log as a central place to organize and revisit the evidence they collect. Collecting evidence will allow a student to weigh the possible sides of an argument and eventually craft a thesis that he or she is able to defend.  Organizing the evidence in a central location or structure helps students review the information they have collected and pick clear and relevant reasons to support their thinking.  You might also use this strategy to help students organize evidence they find that is related to an essential question for a unit or course.

The “fishbowl” is a teaching strategy that helps students practice being contributors and listeners in a discussion. Students ask questions, present opinions, and share information when they sit in the “fishbowl” circle, while students on the outside of the circle listen carefully to the ideas presented and pay attention to process.  Then the roles reverse. This strategy is especially useful when you want to make sure all students participate in the discussion, when you want to help students reflect on what a “good discussion” looks like, and when you need a structure for discussing controversial or difficult topics. Fishbowls make excellent pre-writing activities, often unearthing questions or ideas that students can explore more deeply in an independent assignment.

A Four Corners Debate requires students to show their position on a specific statement (strongly agree, agree, disagree, strongly disagree) by standing in a particular corner of the room. This activity elicits the participation of all students by requiring everyone to take a position. By drawing out students’ opinions on a topic they are about to study, it can be a useful warm-up activity. By asking them to apply what they have learned when framing arguments, it can be an effective follow-through activity. Four Corners can also be used as a pre-writing activity to elicit arguments and evidence prior to essay writing.

During a Gallery Walk, students explore multiple texts or images that are placed around the room.  Teachers often use this strategy as a way to have students share their work with peers, examine multiple historical documents, or respond to a collection of quotations.  Because this strategy requires students to physically move around the room, it can be especially engaging to kinesthetic learners.

Use this strategy to stimulate students thinking as they investigate an essential question or search for evidence in response to an essay prompt over the course of a unit of study.  Students need to interrogate and investigate multiple primary sources and ideas to stimulate their thinking and find evidence. Teachers can also use this strategy as a way to have students share their work with peers. Students will practice being active listeners or readers—an essential skill for learning new information.

Graffiti Boards are a part of the classroom, usually a very large sheet of paper, a whiteboard or chalkboard, where students engage in a written discussion. The purpose of the Graffiti Board strategy is to help students “hear” each other’s ideas. Some benefits of this strategy are that it 1) can be implemented in 5-10 minutes, 2) provides a way for shy students to engage in a conversation, 3) provides a record of students’ ideas and questions that can be referred to at other points during the lesson (or even later in the unit or year), 4) provides space and time for students to process emotional material in the classroom and reflect on their own thoughts as well as the thoughts of others.

Graffiti Boards can be used as a preview or warm-up activity to introduce a new topic or to help students organize prior knowledge about content they are about to study. This strategy can also be used to help students share reactions to texts as preparation for a class discussion, writing assignment, or another project. If you are looking for a silent discussion activity that is structured to encourage deeper understanding and reflection, try a similar teaching strategy called "Big Paper Links to an external site.."

Using the jigsaw teaching strategy is one way to help students understand and retain information, while they develop their collaboration skills.  This strategy asks a group of students to become “experts” on a specific text or body of knowledge and then share that material with another group of students. These “teaching” groups contain one student from each of the “expert” groups. Students often feel more accountable for learning material when they know they are responsible for teaching the content to their peers. The jigsaw strategy is most effective when students know that they will be using the information they have learned from each other to create a final product, participate in a class discussion, or acquire material that will be on a test. 

This discussion format helps students develop their discussion skills, particularly their ability to listen to one another. It is especially useful when trying to discuss controversial topics.

“Save the Last Word for Me” is a discussion strategy that requires all students to participate as active speakers and listeners. Its clearly defined structure helps shy students share their ideas and ensures that frequent speakers practice being quiet. It is often used as a way to help students debrief a reading or film.

The goal of a Socratic seminar is for students to help one another understand the ideas, issues, and values reflected in a specific text. Students are responsible for facilitating a discussion around ideas in the text rather than asserting opinions. Through a process of listening, making meaning, and finding common ground students work toward shared understanding rather than trying to prove a particular argument. A Socratic seminar is not used for the purpose of debate, persuasion, or personal reflection, as the focus is on developing shared meaning of a text.

SPAR is an event in forensic competitions around the country. In this structured debate, students have to frame an argument in one minute and then react quickly to their opponents’ ideas. This strategy helps students practice using evidence and examples to defend a position. Because students are not given much preparation time, SPAR is most effective when students already have background information about the topic. With practice, students become increasingly comfortable and proficient using this method to unearth the pro and con sides of controversial topics.

Reading comes alive when we recognize how the ideas in the text connect to our experiences and beliefs, events happening in the larger world, our understanding of history, and our knowledge of other texts. “Text-to-Text, Text-to-Self, Text-to-World” is a strategy that helps students develop the habit of making these connections. By giving a purpose to students’ reading (i.e. focusing students on paying close attention to text to find connections), this strategy helps students comprehend and make meaning of the ideas in the text. This strategy can be used when reading any text – historical or literary – and it can also be used with other media as well, including films. It can be used at the beginning, middle or end of the reading process – to get students engaged with a text, to help students understand the text more deeply or to evaluate students’ understanding of the text.

This discussion technique gives students the opportunity to thoughtfully respond to questions in written form and to engage in meaningful dialogues with other students around these issues. Asking students to write and discuss ideas with a partner before sharing with the larger group gives students more time to compose their ideas. This format helps students build confidence, encourages greater participation and often results in more thoughtful discussions.

The purpose of town hall meetings is to provide a space for community members to share their perspective on a topic of concern. In this format, different perspectives are often shared as people from different backgrounds and experiences take the floor. This teaching strategy mimics the process of a town hall meeting by providing a structure for different perspectives on a topic to be heard.  Students often come away from this experience with a greater appreciation for how our perspective can limit the facts we have at our disposal and the opinions we hold. By listening to others’ ideas, we broaden our understanding of the world in which we live.

Use this strategy to stimulate students thinking as they investigate an essential question or search for evidence in response to an essay prompt over the course of a unit of study.  Students need to interrogate and investigate multiple primary sources and ideas to stimulate their thinking and find evidence. Teachers can also use this strategy as a way to have students share their work with peers. Students will practice being active listeners or readers—an essential skill for learning new information.

 A “word wall” is a large display in the classroom where the meanings of important ideas are displayed, using words and pictures. When vocabulary may be unfamiliar to students, creating a word wall is one way to help them comprehend and interpret ideas in a text or keep track of new terms from a unit of study.

 This strategy provides an efficient way for all students in a classroom to share their ideas about a question, topic or text. Wraparounds can be provocative discussion-starters as well.

 

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