See Professor Todd Rakoff challenge students to wrestle with legal concepts in groups first, to yield a more cogent, interactive class discussion in an Instructional Moves video from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Canvas discussions provides an option that requires students to post replies to a discussion before seeing others’ responses, which can encourage original thinking and prevent a dominant voice from discouraging other responses.
Paola Arlotta immerses students in material to develop a natural understanding of key concepts, then frames their thinking to present formalized knowledge and terminology of the field.
Dr. Carl Novina, Associate Professor of Medicine, and his co-instructor Shannon Turley, amended the traditional graduate seminar Critical Reading for Immunology to teach students comprehension and presentation skills essential to a career in biomedical science. To introduce a topic, students read research papers and present a focused background on the field the paper sought to advance. Then, rather than discussing the paper linearly, students select a key figure that best highlighted the main point. Throughout the semester,students revisit central points of papers and diagram them on the white board—“an effective means to help students better process information and have greater insights into central concepts from the presentations and papers.”
In "Inviting Students to Take a Stand and Disagree,” Tim McCarthy (HKS/FAS) reflects on how he honors charged responses in his classroom while establishing norms of respect.
Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Teaching and Learning Lab Newsletter from spring 2017 highlights protocols instructors have used to facilitate discussion with a resource guide.
The Harvard Business School’s Christensen Center for Teaching and Learning offers guidelines for questioning, listening, and responding for faculty leading class discussion.