Leading Discussions in the Classroom
Encouraging Student Participation in Discussion can be challenging to even the most experienced teacher. B.G. Davis offers ideas about fostering and increasing student participation, supporting quiet students, managing the "talkers," and keeping discussions moving in productive directions.
The Dreaded Discussion: Ten Ways to Start describes very precisely several ways to structure and start discussions that address different learning goals.
Part of fostering discussion in class is knowing how to ask and answer questions. This guide to Answering and Asking Questions addresses such issues as how to ask questions for different learning purposes, different ways to redirect student questions to start discussion, how to handle pauses and silence, and how to create a classroom climate to encourage more participation by students.
Communication Skills for Leading Discussion identifies specific communication skills, such as attending, supporting, paraphrasing, clarifying, summarizing, linking, and blocking, that can help faculty increase their own comfort in leading discussions, and the quality of student participation.
Discussions can break down when student participation is minimal, misdirected, or inappropriate. Difficult Behaviors in the Classroom offers solutions and approaches to responding positively to side conversations, rambling, grandstanding, and even hostility.
For more information on this or any teaching related topic, please contact the Pew Faculty Teaching and Learning Center (x3499) or ftlc@gvsu.edu.
Page last modified October 5, 2012
