Guidelines for Discussion Leadership

 


 


Leading In-Class Discussions

 

The purpose of this assignment is to allow participants to lead the class discussion on topics of importance in the course.  Skills to be developed are: teaching and facilitating skills, intellective skills, and verbal skills.  One participant will be assigned primary responsibility for each reading assignment.  The leader will: (a) prepare and present a 5-10 minute opening analysis of the material, (b) lead the subsequent class discussion.  To facilitate this, please prepare a handout for the students and instructor consisting of the following items: (1) a short abstract of the reading (if you write, less than 1/3 page single spaced), simply copying the abstract when it is provided in the original reading or creating a new one when it is not provided, (2) short bios of the authors from materials available on the Web, including photo, where available, and career information (start with: http://www.isfacdir.org/ but also do a Google search), (3) a short, up to 1 page (single-spaced) critique of the material including, where appropriate, its relation to other relevant readings in the course; and (4) several key questions you want to have the class discuss.  These items are to be neatly prepared and a copy is to be distributed to each member of the class in e-mailboxes by 9:00 a.m. of class day.  Also, bring a few extra hard copies to class as people may not have been able to get to their email in a timely manner.

Your job is to inspire your class members and get them involved in the dialogue. The intention is not for you to talk for a half hour or so. You may "cold call" your class members to get them engaged. Or you can warn them in advance that you want them to wrestle with a certain issue. Your choice.

Participants will also be responsible for choosing and leading the discussion on an experiment in an area of research interest to group members.  This is an individual assignment. Copies of the article need to be made available to each class member.

Deliverables: Abstract and critique of reading; leadership of in-class discussion on topic.