Are Socratic Seminars formative or summative?

They can function as formative or summative assessments, depending how and when they are used. They are student centered and can benefit students at all levels.

What type of seminar is Socratic?

A Socratic Seminar is a method to try to understand information by creating a dialectic class in regards to a specific text. In a Socratic Seminar, participants seek deeper understanding complex ideas in the text through rigorously thoughtful dialogue. This process encourages divergent thinking rather than convergent.

What is the Socratic method of formative assessment?

Methods of assessment in a Socratic classroom

In the Socratic method, the learning experience is based on a continuous dialogue between teacher and students, and both sides move it forward by questioning different things. It's a genuinely engaging discussion that has much more impact in the practice of learning.

What is the Socratic seminar method of teaching?

Socratic seminars are named for their embodiment of Socrates' belief in the power of asking questions, prize inquiry over information and discussion over debate. Socratic seminars acknowledge the highly social nature of learning and align with the work of John Dewey, Lev Vygotsky, Jean Piaget, and Paulo Friere.

How do you assess a Socratic seminar?

Criteria you might use to evaluate a Socratic Seminar activity include engagement (everyone listening and sharing), respect (no interruptions or put-downs), meaning-making (students understand the text more deeply at the end of the seminar), and use of evidence (comments always refer back to the text).

Formative and Summative Assessment

What are the 3 rules of a Socratic seminar?

Show respect for differing ideas, thoughts, and values—no put-downs or sarcasm. Allow each speaker enough time to begin and finish his or her thoughts— don't interrupt. Involve others in the discussion, and ask them to elaborate on their responses.

What are the 4 elements of a Socratic seminar?

These Seminars foster active learning as participants explore and evaluate the ideas, issues, and values in a particular text. An effective seminar consists of four interdependent elements: (1) the text being considered, (2) the questions raised, (3) the seminar leader, and (4) the participants.

Is Socratic method a teaching strategy?

Getting Students to Interact With the Text. The Socratic method is a teaching tactic in which questions are asked continually until either the student gives a wrong answer or reasoning or the teacher is satisfied with the student's responses.

Is Socratic seminar effective in classroom learning?

In summary, the format of the Socratic Seminar leads students to exactly the kind of reading, writing, listening, speaking, and thinking that is required of them in the Common Core. The benefits are far reaching, and go a long way towards building critical thinking abilities and communication skills.

Why do teachers do Socratic seminar?

The purpose of a Socratic Seminar is to achieve a deeper understanding about the ideas and values in a text. In the Seminar, participants systematically question and examine issues and principles related to a particular content, and articulate different points-of-view.

What determines whether the assessment is formative or summative?

Formative assessments have low stakes and usually carry no grade, which in some instances may discourage the students from doing the task or fully engaging with it. The goal of summative assessment is to evaluate student learning at the end of an instructional unit by comparing it against some standard or benchmark.

What is an example of a formative and summative assessment?

Formative and summative assessments should be adaptable

For example, 'test style questions' can be used both as formative assessment (perhaps as exit tickets – questions given to students at the end of the lesson to check student understanding) or summative (perhaps as an end of an instructional unit test or check).

What is another name for Socratic seminar?

A Socratic seminar (also known as a Socratic circle) is a pedagogical approach based on the Socratic method and uses a dialogic approach to understand information in a text.

What grade level is Socratic seminar?

They can be used at any grade level with any subject area. In a Socratic Seminar, members meet in a circle (or more likely an oval, because, let's be real, circles are really hard to create) and share their insights. Participants do not raise their hands or call on names.

Is a Socratic seminar the same as a seminar?

“A Seminar is a question-focused, student-led, and teacher-facilitated discussion, based on appropriate texts. Sometimes we call this activity a 'Socratic Seminar'–after Socrates, well known for his open-ended dialogues.

What are the learning outcomes of the Socratic seminar?

What are the 5 Socratic questions?

How many times should you talk in a Socratic seminar?

-‐-‐During the Socratic seminar each student should speak at least three times.

What are the cons of Socratic Seminar?

It can be time-consuming, difficult to manage, and may not be suitable for all subjects or topics. Additionally, it may not be effective for all students, particularly those who are unprepared, lack background knowledge, or feel intimidated.

What are the disadvantages of Socratic method of teaching?

Disadvantages of the Socratic method include: Easy failure rate without student participation. A fear of public speaking is common. Loss of interest possible when a professor is speaking with an individual student.

What are the criticism of the Socratic method?

also describes some common criticisms of the Socratic method: that it is boring, that students learn little from watching a dialogue between another student and the professor, that it is an inefficient way to teach a large amount of information and that it allows the professor to refuse to answer direct questions.

What skills do Socratic Seminars build?

Because of this, Socratic seminars offer a ripe opportunity for direct teaching and assessing all five areas of the framework for SEL by the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning: social awareness, self-awareness, self-management, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making.

What is a core question in a Socratic seminar?

Opening questions should get the seminar off to a start, core questions should help participants examine deeper meanings in the text, and closing questions should help the group bring the seminar to a close, though not necessarily a conclusion.

What are the best questions for a Socratic seminar?