Teaching Students Respectful Discourse

July 25, 2022

By Aleta Margolis, Founder and President, Center for Inspired Teaching

Hooray for Monday is a weekly blog filled with questions, ideas, reflections, and actions we can all take to remodel the school experience for students.

Though Meryl Streep spoke those words in 2015, they are as critically important now as ever. Just this past week, the January 6 hearings are wrapping up (or, at least, gearing up), Covid cases are back on the rise, and our country continues the painful struggle to come to some kind of agreement on how to protect ourselves from gun violence. What could be more important than teaching our young people how to engage in discourse – on issues large and small – with “grace,” “respect,” and “empathetic listening.”

Those qualities live at the core of what an Inspired Teacher is and does.

A list outline of Inspired Teacher traits, outlining the capabilities for teaching students respectful discourse

This week I want to tell you about an important tool you can use to teach your students these complex and critical skills. Inspired Teaching’s Speak Truth Teacher Guidebook is a compilation of our proven resources for engaging your students in meaningful, respectful discourse about issues that matter to them. It’s aligned with the C3 (College, Career, and Civic Life) Framework of the National Council for the Social Studies, and the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts and Literacy.

Everyone can download the Guidebook, for free, and learn how to engage students in student-led dialogue in a productive, respectful manner. This process not only builds critical skills like “empathetic listening,” but it also offers an exciting way of involving students in the learning process and promotes deep learning and understanding of content.

And if you are an educator (in a school or in an out-of-school time program) in Washington, DC, you can become a true expert in elevating student voice by applying to become a Speak Truth Fellow! Details are below, but the best part is that you’ll get to spend three days with us in-person in early August, delving into Inspired Teaching’s 100% engaging, improvisation-based professional learning.

Two students having respectful discourse while seated at desks during a Speak Truth event

Our students have so many ideas, questions, concerns, and suggestions. One of our most important jobs as educators is to help them articulate their concerns and their recommendations and to teach them to listen wholeheartedly to the concerns and viewpoints of their peers. If we can teach our students to speak and listen to one another with respect, we’ll be setting them, and ourselves, up for a hopeful future.

Wishing you a lovely week ahead!

Resources

Download the Guidebook

Elevating youth voices is critically important not only for students’ well-being, but for their development as problem-solvers and future leaders. The Speak Truth model presented in this Guide offers a way to bring meaningful student-led conversations into the classroom.

Seeing with Different Eyes

As you gear up for the new school year, an activity like this accomplishes many things at once. It puts student voices front and center in the learning experience (they share observations drawn from a compelling image). It also helps you get to know them as you observe how they take in and share information.

Listening with Someone Else’s Ears

This is another good activity for returning to school and establishing a culture of empathy in your classroom. Using improvisation, students are invited to step into the role of someone (or something!) else, imagine what they would say, and listen to what those around that person are saying too.

Listen to This Issue of Hooray For Monday

InspiredTeaching · July 25, 2022: What's Missing from Public Discourse?

Micaiah Anderson

Community Outreach Specialist

As a Community Outreach Specialist, Micaiah is responsible for program promotion and outreach support for Inspired Teaching events and workshops. Micaiah has a passion for collaborating with community members to build-power and connect. She is an educator with a heart for youth and has experience supporting students fight injustices within their schools and communities. She has a BA in Political Science from, the real HU, Hampton University & anticipates graduating in May 2024 with a Masters of Arts degree in Educational Policy Transformation from Georgetown University.

AUTONOMY

"I want to have a say in what happens to me."

Autonomy is the need for independence; the ability to make choices, to create, to explore, and to express oneself freely; to have sufficient space, to move around, and to feel unrestricted with opportunities to exercise free will.

Brady Maiden

Outreach Coordinator

As the Outreach Coordinator, Brady helps maintain Inspired Teaching’s social media presence and supports the organization’s mission to connect with DC community leaders, educators, and parents. Brady has her Master’s in Public Policy from George Mason University and her BS in Political Science from Northern Arizona University. She is passionate about community, equity, and coalition building recognizing that learning and growing with the community at large is how we continue to be impactful.

What brings you joy in life?

I find joy in spending time with my friends and family and meeting new people. I like going to concerts and festivals, and finding new books to read.

The Learner’s Cycle, Wonder-Experiment-Learn, and the Teacher’s Cycle, Observe-Plan-Instigate, comprise Inspired Teaching’s approach to engaging students in inquiry-based learning.

When they are engaged in the Wonder-Experiment-Learn Cycle, students are immersed in learning. They take the lead in designing authentic learning experiences around their own interests and their school’s standards of learning. Each discovery leads to a new question which in turn leads to more wondering and more learning. In the Wonder-Experiment-Learn Cycle, Learn is not a destination or an endpoint; it is a deeper understanding, leading to a deeper wondering and new possibilities that create new entry points to further exploration. The cycle continues because what students have learned generates more wonderings that require more experiments that foster more learning – and on and on.

The Observe-Plan-Instigate Cycle is the work of an Inspired Teacher. While a student is expected to follow the Wonder-Experiment-Learn Cycle, the teacher joins them on the learning journey while following their own cycle of Observe-Plan-Instigate. This cycle ultimately serves to ensure an inquiry-based atmosphere is at play in the classroom.

Jaqueta Abbey

Teaching and Learning Specialist

Jaqueta is the Teaching and Learning Specialist for Inspired Teaching. In addition to her current role with Inspired Teaching, Jaqueta is a first-grade teaching assistant. Her background features a variety of traditional and non-traditional experiences in the field of education, including working as an adjunct professor, teaching summer reading programs to children and adults, and tutoring children in the foster care system. Jaqueta earned a B.A. in Communication Studies from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and an M.A. in Interactive Media from Elon University.

What brings you joy in life?

Creative self-expression! In addition to my passion for storytelling, I love dancing of all kinds. I've studied belly dance, bachata, and Brazilian Zouk among other styles. I also enjoy glass fusing, crocheting, photography, and cross stitching. These art forms allow me to express myself and build connections with other people at the same time. I think life would be a lot less vibrant without artists and storytellers!

Michelle Welk

Communication & Marketing Specialist

As Communications and Marketing Specialist, Michelle is responsible for finding and creating new ways to highlight Inspired Teaching and promote its programs in order to expand and deepen the organization's impact. Michelle has worked in communications in an array of settings, from creative agencies to state politics to national nonprofits. She has a BA in Journalism from Temple University in Philadelphia and is passionate about education, access, and equity.

What brings you joy in life?

My son, the beach, making a persuasive argument and good food!

Max Peterson

Real World History Assistant Teacher

Max received his Bachelor’s degree in History and African American Studies from Boston University in May 2016. He has worked in museum curation at the Museum of the White Mountains in New Hampshire and the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. Max has worked with young people of varying ages from young children to young adults transitioning to college.

Feedback and Accountability

We grow through feedback and an understanding that the quality of our work is a reflection of what we are learning, but the shift to remote learning this spring disrupted a lot of the tools teachers were used to using to evaluate student growth. How might we do things differently this fall? Participants in this workshop will explore ways to bring meaningful assessment into the virtual and/or socially-distanced classroom and approaches to student feedback that strengthen motivation, and build relationships and achievement.