Socratic Teaching: A Guidebook for Classical Christian Teachers

Socratic Teaching: A Guidebook for Classical Christian Teachers

Welcome to the wonderful world of discussion-based learning. Socratic Teaching , also known as discussion-based learning, fosters a fantastic environment for students to grow in knowledge, wisdom, faith, and virtue. This book is VERY practical and easy to implement for any teacher seeking to improve the process of Socratic Methods in the classroom. Socratic Teaching provides students with an opportunity to fully appreciate and absorb a topic, text, or idea and the rich truths and nuanced interconnectivity of all subjects while also learning more about themselves and others in the process. Like all teaching techniques, it requires practice, preparation, creativity, adaptation, patience, wisdom, and fortitude from both teachers and students. However, when everyone in the room commits to the cultivation of a cohesive learning community, it is a beautiful and transformational experience for everyone involved in the process. There are several things for teachers to consider when implementing the use of Socratic Teaching as a major teaching tool in a classroom. Teachers should consider the roles of participants, preparation required, structure of the classroom furniture, specific techniques, responsibilities of individuals, assignments to be completed before class, training of the students, benefits from discussion-based learning, and the philosophy of grading. These topics are expounded upon in this book.