Dialectic Teaching with Susan Sandretto

 

Dialectic Teaching with Susan Sandretto

In March, I was privileged to talk via Zoom to Susan Sandretto from the University of Otago about Dialectic teaching. This meeting was planned to support me in reaching my appraisal goals. 

I have found out my notes from that meeting and have started to think more about how to implement dialectic teaching into my practise. 

Main points from our Zoom Meeting: 

- We make a distinction between talk rules (Talanoa) and talk moves and learning goals. 

- Less is more. Build a foundation and layer up. Don't try to do it all at once. 

- The default teaching method is often IRE (initiate, respond evaluate). This is only really effective for revision - not new thinking and learning. 

- Pick a focus from the Talanoa rules or talk moves. Review at the end, "What did we get better at?" This promotes metacognition. 

- Create a checklist in a modelling book. Include the learning goal and the talk moves that will help us achieve hat learning goal. (e.g. eye to eye, knee to knee)

- Model the talk moves yourself first 

- We picked three talk moves to work on: 

Say more - encouraging more than a 'correct' answer

Think time - e.g. take a drink while students think before anyone can answer. Including time for students to write down their thoughts 

Wait time  - saying, "we give each other time," when a student is taking their turn. 

My plan was to pull aside a small group of students to work alongside me as I learned more about the talk rules and talk moves. A few days later, we were into Lockdown 1. So now I'm re-looking at how I can continue this learning. More about that in the next blog post.