Hearing their own voice: Consistent student participation while discussing polarizing topics

This post is republished from Into Practice, a biweekly communication of Harvard’s Office of the Vice Provost for Advances in Learning

Elizabeth Papp Kamali, Assistant Professor of Law, wants to ensure that students contribute consistently throughout the semester: "A student can get into a rut if they don't participate in those first few classes, and it can be very difficult to break that cycle." She uses different models to encourage participation—for example, the Socratic method in larger introductory courses and student-led discussion in smaller seminars—often asking students to adopt non-mainstream arguments. 

The benefits: Compelling student participation brings diverse perspectives—intellectual, demographic, and experiential—to the classroom,... Read more about Hearing their own voice: Consistent student participation while discussing polarizing topics