The Psychology of Classroom Discussions

Published: 2018-09-25 02:51 |

Category: Teaching | Tags: Asch experiment, group think, methods, questioning, responses, students


I've never heard of the Asch Experiment, but this video is worth watching.

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA-gbpt7Ts8[/embed]

[Kaplinsky's article](https://robertkaplinsky.com/psychology-classroom-discussions/) gives some good classroom ideas on how to avoid groupthink in student responses, even highlighting the Desmos teacher view to anonymize responses (which _also_ works [outside of math](https://blog.ohheybrian.com/2017/04/desmos-in-science/).

During student teaching, questioning was the first thing my training teacher worked on with me. I was prone to asking, "Who knows..." which left the door open to zero responses. Moving to direct questions, "What is...?" or "How does...?" removes escape. I also recall another great post (I can't find it now) about leaving uncomfortable silence after asking a question. Letting several hands go up in the air allows for discussion as you can call on more than the first student.

Mixing Kaplinsky's ideas with leaving room for responses is a great way to help students feel comfortable with replying, even if they disagree with others.

[Read the original article here](https://robertkaplinsky.com/psychology-classroom-discussions/).

Comments are always open. You can get in touch by sending me an email at brian@ohheybrian.com