Active participation in discussion offers a possibility of improved learning by giving students practice at accessing and processing new information by explaining, summarizing, questioning, or connecting to other ideas. Ideally, academic discussions are places for critical analysis; they are open to questioning and exploring ideas and beliefs, even those that are widely accepted. 

The most successful classroom discussions are guided by specific teaching goals, so the discussion serves a purpose in students’ progression in the course. According to McGonigal (2005) three examples of teaching goals that can be well served by discussions are: 

1. Increase students’ comfort with the specialized language and methods of a field.
2. Develop critical thinking.
3. Develop problem-solving skills.

Planning for discussion

Clarify your goals and expectations. Discussions whose goals are to check for students’ factual understanding might not be as rich as those in which students are expected to apply, synthesize, and evaluate ideas by considering meaningful problems.

Consider what your role in the discussion will be. Will you act as a facilitator, keeping the class focused and encouraging thoughtful participation? Or will you be more of an expert participant contributing equally (or more) to the discussion alongside your students?

Preparing yourself and your students for class discussions

Communicate the discussion topic, your expectations, and the ground rules for participation. For example:

• Is there a process by which a student is given the floor for speaking? Such as raising their hand to speak, being called on at random, or another process?
• Students may need reminders to listen respectfully, carefully consider others’ ideas, keep an open mind and be willing to reconsider their ideas.
• How will you provide guidance to keep the discussion focused, and not allow students to get sidetracked into new topics?

Model and practice skills

Give students the opportunity to prepare and be ready for discussion. For example: 

Provide students relevant background information such as readings, videos, discussion topics, question prompts,or fact-checking exercises to prepare them to back up or argue a position.

Give students a disciplinary “lens” through which to consider questions on a topic, for example, “A historian would pay most attention to _____, and would discuss it in terms of _____”

Refer to study question(s), discussion goals, or relevant prior course information.

Starting the discussion

Having a common experience can be a starting point for a class discussion. For example, students could be required to review or critique an assigned text, prepare to support or oppose a controversial topic, or be ready to solve a complex real-world problem.

Start the discussion with recall or orienting questions. These require students to recall some aspect of the topic, or orients them to a discussion topic. For example:

• what aspect of the text or topic stood out for them, as interesting, confusing, etc.
• ways a challenge might be addressed, what additional information would be needed

Ask open-ended questions, or those that support multiple points of view, such as:

• What are the implications of this idea or this method from the reading/video?
• What struck you as most successful (or challenging) from the reading?
• What are some other approaches the researcher might have tried? 

What about facing a silent room? Students may need time, and a period of silence, to think before they respond or engage. You can make the initial silence deliberate, as a time for students to compose their 

thoughts. Instructions could be to take two minutes to think about or draft a written responses to the question.

Managing and maintaining discussion

Encourage participation. Common participation challenges may require you to take an active role in setting participation expectations and facilitating the discussion. Some ideas include setting time limits on individual speakers, inviting comments from quiet students, or (outside of class) asking domineering students to hold back. In a large class, you can have students discuss in pairs or small groups, in addition to the whole group, to increase the chance of everyone participating at some level.

What if students are not interested? If students are uninterested, you could try to make the topic more relevant to them and impacts their lives. There may be ways in which a student’s personal experience or observation can help them to make connections with the significance of the material or topic.

Question types to maintain discussion: Different types of questions facilitate different types of student responses. Brookfield (2005) offers categories and question examples that can help maintain the momentum of a discussion.

Requests for evidence: If a student states an opinion that seems unconnected or erroneous, the instructor’s response can be phrased to ask for more information without refuting the speaker:

• How do you know that?
• What is the evidence that supports that claim? (This may be data, or a published author’s expression.)

Requests for clarification: Clarification questions give the speakers a chance to more fully express their ideas.

• Can you put that another way?
• What’s an example?

Linking questions - These questions encourage participants to build on one another’s responses.

• Is there a connection between what you just said and what ____ said earlier?
• Does your idea challenge or support what we’ve been talking about, and how?

Cause and effect, or hypothetical questions: Ask students to consider how a change would impact an outcome. How would making a change to a problem change the results? 

Summary and synthesis questions: Ask students to recall, evaluate, and make use of what’s already been said.

• What are one or two most important ideas from the discussion?
• What do you understand better as a result of the discussion?
• What remains unresolved, or unclear?

Assessing student learning

One method to reinforce learning and check how well the discussion contributed to your learning goals is to assign a followup in which students reflect and write. Topics for writing could include: what the student learned from the discussion; whether, and how, the discussion changed or reinforced their thinking or understanding; an evaluation of the process and quality of the discussion, or of their own contributions; or ideas of ways the discussion topics and process could be generalIzed or applied to another topic.

Citations:

• Brookfield, Stephen D., and Stephen Preskill. “Discussion as a Way of Teaching: Tools and Techniques for Democratic Classrooms (Jossey Bass Higher and Adult Education Series).” (2005).
• McGonigal, Kelly. “Using class discussion to meet your teaching goals.” Speaking of Teaching 15.1 (2005). Retrieved May 31, 2016 from http://web.stanford.edu/dept/CTL/Newsletter/discussion_leading.pdf and https://tomprof.stanford.edu/posting/745