Socratic Discussions in English
Evidence From Research
Potential Challenges
Positive Impact for Student Learning
Description of Strategy
Evidence From Students
"Thought flourishes as questions are asked, not as answers are found" (Smith, 1990, p. 129).
Students articulate their ideas freely and with confidence, hopefully without the fear of being 'wrong'. Students assist on another to delve deeper into texts or ideas (Alexander, 2008).
Evidence From Teaching Practice
Ideally, students need to be familiar and/or knowledgeable about the content that will be discussed. As a result, this strategy would not be suitable as a pre-reading strategy or as an introduction to a particular text/topic (Jensen, 2015).
Teacher and student preparation is essential. "We cannot expect students to discuss a topic without adequate preparation" (Hill, 2001, p. 19). Similarly, if teachers are facilitating a conversation about a text or topic, they need to have a deep understanding of the content and be flexible enough to consider the productive tangents that students may take.
Depending on numbers, students split into two groups [inner circle & outer circle]. The room is set up in a circle or horseshoe. Inner circle will discuss a topic or text - teacher may facilitate, but it is up to students to provide questions and discussion. THE GOAL IS CURIOUS DISCUSSION. Students might agree or disagree with arguments, provide evidence from the text, provide links to other bits of text etc. This is where 'elenchus' occurs, whereby a students' hypotheses are scrutinised, and they are forced to use evidence. Once inner circle has finished, the outer circle provides feedback on the discussion [metacognition], and suggests avenues of conversation that the inner circle left out. Ultimately, a Socratic discussion is not a debate, but seeks to have students work together to construct meaning (Grondin, 2018; Jensen, 2015; Delic & Becirovic, 2016).
Socratic Discussion is positively correlated with performance. It is unclear what constitutes 'performance' (Grondin, 2018).
Students think critically for themselves, articulate their own thoughts and respond directly to others. They work collaboratively and respectfully when engaging in intelligent conversation (Holden & Schmit, 2002). #
Inquiry might devolve into tangents (Grondin, 2018, p. 23). #
Younger students might not be able to maintain an environment of mutual, respectful and academic discussion (Grondin, 2018, p. 23) #
The discussion might become too dualistic (Grondin, 2018, p. 23)
Discussions shouldn't centre on a simple concept e.g. the narrative arc of a character. Instead, it should encourage critical thinking and open up discussions to a number of different discussions e.g. whether Macbeth was responsible for his own downfall. Ideas adapted from Hill (2001).
Discussions should have a narrow focus. Discussing whole texts or broad notions e.g. love, patriotism can often omit important parts of a text or only permit superficial discussion i.e. start narrow and be prepared for conversations to become broader. (Hill, 2001, p. 19).
Teachers should MODEL appropriate responses for students prior to discussion [likely in previous lessons] (Zemelman, Daniels & Hyde, 1998, p. 82). Students need to be explicitly taught the mechanics of 'fierce' conversations (Kipp-Newbold, 2010, p. 77)
This strategy is consistent with elements of pedagogical theory espoused by Dewey, Vygotsky, Piaget and Freire (Holden & Schmit, 2002, p. 3)
This approach requires teachers to have embraced a constructivist perspective - students create knowledge from listening to each other and drawing on their wider experiences (Holden & Schmit, 2002, p. 7)
Socratic discussions are a means of increasing students' cognitive and social functioning (Polite and Adams, 1997).
Socratic discussion improved students' motivation to learn (Dietrich, 2015)
Student surveys and reflections can give teachers qualitative data regarding whether or not Socratic discussions have engaged them/motivated them to learn/made the content more exciting (Dietrich, 2015). Questions may centre on things like confidence, satisfaction, peer collaboration, safety, positive student-teacher relationships etc. #
Marginal quantitative gains, but substantial qualitative gains [question-making ability, reflection skills and critical thinking] (Dietrich, 2015, p. 26). Consider if there is a way to measure this in class? Perhaps just qualitative teacher observations. #
Students establishing their own class rules for Socratic Discussions can assist in ensuring respectful conversation (Richardson, 2010, p. 85; Griswold, Shaw & Munn, 2017, p. 492-493).
Students tend to view direct transmission as conventional, stereotypical 'teaching', and therefore develop inimical attitudes towards it. Alternatively, students view Socratic discussions as something novel and unique, where they have more agency (Tikva, 2010). Therefore, hopefully students' are noticeably happier to be in class and enthusiastic about contributing, rather than it being a mandatory obligation.
POTENTIAL ASSESSMENT
Students can score a maximum of 10 points from Socratic discussion. Students and teacher come up with a 'criteria' for how much certain contributions are worth i.e. posing a relevant, good question would be 1 point, whereas a substantial contribution that synthesises a broad range of concepts and uses evidence might be worth 3 points. This might also prevent strong students from dominating the whole conversation, and allow quieter students to contribute. It also allowed teachers to obtain concrete evidence of student understanding (Hill, 2001).
Socratic Discussions about Muslim cultures in young adult literature afforded students increased intercultural understanding / appreciation and forced them to challenge their assumptions and previous beliefs (Baer & Glasgow, 2010)
Whereas face-to-face Socratic Discussion bred more 'soft skills', the online forum version stimulated greater engagement with the text and higher incidences of students referring to specific textual features and techniques (Walsh-Moorman, 2016, p. 77).
Been shown to be successful in inclusive classrooms, which included students with disabilities. "Seminars helped develop responsibility and independence, and promote a sense of classroom community" (Chorzempa & Lapidus, 2009, p. 58).