Sept 27 Discussion Questions

When leading a class discussion, should you make participation and speaking mandatory/worth points for the overall grade, or is it better to let students act on their own and not be forced?

Regarding class discussion and participation, how well do you think incorporationg participation into students' grades works?

The author suggests that being the devil's advocate is a good way to spark discussion. He also states that one of the negative sides is that the students may percieve the teacher as just showing "how smart he is how easily he can fool us". Do you percieve this as a potential problem? If so how else do you show the students the other side of the arguement?

I think small group discussions can help students who normally don't participate to share their ideas. Could this format be used in each class period for 5 or 10 minutes? Also, should the instructor mingle among the groups answering questions (or asking leading ones), or stay back and allow the students to work out solutions on their own?

McKeachie suggest summarizing the conclusions after a discussion class, often it seems to me in a discussion class we don't come to a firm conclusion. How would you utilize this technique if that were the case?

In Chapter 5, McKeachie suggests that during the first class discussion period, students should write a brief autobiographal life history indicating interests and experiences relevant to the course. He says that he uses these to "get to know his students" and their "special knowledge". He says that the one of the best ways to get non-participants to participate into discussions is to ask them to contribute in an area where they have special knowledge. Does this seem feasible, especially in an intro class?

McKeachie brings up the topic of online discussions only briefly. What are the pros and cons of using that platform instead of in-class discussions, especially in larger classes?

McKeachie talks about using the Socratic method in teaching. I can see how it would be important to get students to question their learing, but would this method be appropriate for an intro class, and has anyone ever seen this method used to lead a discussion?

Is it ok to ask an "overtalker" during class to give others a chance, or should you discuss that outside of class?

What if there is a discussion going on in class, and one student gets extremely offended? What do you do? Does that mean that you should not have anymore discussions in that class?

Our author talks about the importance of students getting to know each other, and, ultimately, gaining trust for one another. This seems like a great idea, but, in my mind, it would be more problematic to achieve such trust between everyone in a larger class. Should larger class groups be fixed (i.e. the same groups of people together all semester), or should individuals rotate from group to group in hopes that trust will be facilitated? Which seems ideal for a class with over 100 people or larger, and why?