My Version of Discussion: The Not-So-Socratic Seminar

In most of my classes, my students love to discuss things.  They love it so much they would rather discuss where I bought my shoes or why I like the color green if it meant they got to have a conversation. 

...Except for one class.  I'm sure we all have that one class.  The one that makes you feel like an idiot for even thinking they would want to answer one of your questions.  The class where you ask a question and you give wait time...to the point of it becoming awkward.  You know that class.

To alleviate the pain and suffering of trying to get through a class discussion (or Socratic Seminar), I have created a way (I think) to force my students into group discussions.  I'm not sure if this has ever actually been done or suggested before.  I know I'm stealing a few different ideas from other places and putting them together into one strategy.  If you know that this actually exists somewhere else, let me know.  I don't want to walk around thinking I created something if it's something someone else did!

Here's the idea:

After reading a section of the assigned novel, I'm going to discuss levels of questioning with my students.  I got this idea from Jim Burke.  Then, I'm going to have my students each ask one inductive or analytical question about the reading we did.  I will have them write these questions on the individual white boards I have in my room.  You could hand out half-sheets of paper or sticky notes instead.

Then I'm going to get the students into groups of four.  They will have two minutes to read each question the group members have created and decide, as a group, which question is the best question, or the question they are most interested in answering.

Once each group has decided on a question, they will be given a notecard; they will write the group question on one side of the notecard.  Then they will get time for each individual to write their answer to the group question on their whiteboards--about a minute or so.  Then they will be given time to share their answers in their groups.  As a group, they will have to synthesize everyone's answer into one "BEST answer," which they will place on the back of their notecards. I will give about three or four minutes for this.

I will collect notecards and disperse them out to the other groups (this way each group will get a new question).  I will hand out four sticky notes to each group and one regular sized piece of paper.  The group will read the question and, without turning over the card to see the answer, each group member will write his/her answer on their own sticky note.  After a minute or so, I will call time and have the group members each put their sticky notes on one corner of the paper.  This way all four corners will have a sticky note with an answer to the question on it.  Like this:

Then the group members will need to synthesize their answers into the best answer (like in the picture).  They can then compare their answer to the answer on the notecard. If it is the same, great.  If it is different, the group needs to explain why their answer is the more correct answer on the back of their sheet of paper.  This may take five or more minutes to complete.  Groups would then turn all their work back in to me.

In this way, groups will be discussing, analyzing, inferring, synthesizing, and evaluating.  Whew!  And all in ONE class period.  Not too shabby.  AND so very much better than having to resort to crazy measures to get students to participate.  What do you think?  Do you do anything quite like this?  I've done the four-corners sticky note activity by itself, but never anything this in depth.