Socratic Seminar: AVID Style Discussion

I have mentioned Socratic Seminar and I want to take some time to discuss it in depth. Like the Decision Making Process, Socratic Seminar develops critical thinking skills and learning through discussion/collaboration. It also promotes analysis of a specific text as students discuss a writing piece by piece. Also like the Decision Making Process, Socratic Seminar is a process that needs to be modeled, teaching the steps and practicing the method to improve students' skills and learning experience. I like to use Socratic Seminar as pre-review test review. In other words, I often do it the day before our test review day. In Social Studies the texts I use are newspaper articles, speeches, legal documents, and segments of books. I also have students analyze media (government propaganda, photographs, art, video). Here is a short explanation of the Socratic Seminar process.

For a more detailed explanation this link is a good, comprehensive one:
http://www.maxlow.net/avid/socsem/socraticseminaroverview.html

Note: To hear the videos, headphones might be necessary.

This is a video of middle schoolers engaging in Socratic Seminar. This is one example of how a teacher can facilitate the discussion. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pGVR6ZF_2M (Walker Middle School)

This video shows educators going through the Socratic Seminar process with text of the process overlaid as each step is demonstrated. This inner/outer circle is the standard practice of AVID's Socratic Seminar: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDP75I1b5Do (adults)

Here are two examples of high schoolers participating in Socratic Seminar. The first is an English class. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxZMGK6IdEs (high school)

This is a high school Social Studies class:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQ4MYD6HLR4 (another high school)