Teaching Small Groups - Facilitating Discussion in Seminars and Tutorials

Aimed At: This workshop is aimed at those who wish to develop their teaching and facilitation skills in order to lead small group, discursive teaching sessions.

Workshop Overview

Are you faced with a wall of silence from your seminar group?

Do all your attempts at facilitating discussions result in reticence?

This one day workshop will equip you with some tools to help you to tackle and respond to diversity in the classroom which can impact on discussions.

In Seminars and Practical classes students are required to communicate with each other and with their tutors. In many cases the specific development of communication skills (presentation, debate, discussion, criticality, problem solving in teams, etc) are explicitly noted as workshop learning outcomes. However, many students appear to be under-confident and ill at ease in such situations and it can require all the skill of the tutor and application of teaching technique and facilitative methods to encourage participation.

Learning Objectives

At the end of the workshop participants will be able to:

  • Explain why discussion is important in the discipline
  • Practice the skills of questioning and active listening to facilitate discussion
  • Review and prepare for situations which cause difficulty in free communication within a small group, such as novice language skills, dominating students, quiet students, disability issues, etc.
  • Consider ways in which the curriculum design can be enhanced to help students to develop their skills of communication, presentation and discussion
Newcastle Offer
  • Assessment and Feedback
  • Research-Informed Teaching
  • Student Engagement
Outline Programme

The workshop programme is as follows:

  • The importance of discursive classes for student learning
  • The skills of tutoring and facilitation
  • Handling difficult situations in discussion based classes
  • Responding to issues of diversity in the classroom
  • Develop teaching strategies and course design which enable students to practice and develop their skills of communication
Booking Details
Trainer

Kate Exley

9:15am - 4:30pm

    It is not possible to access the workshop booking form unless connected to the University's campus network, should you wish to book a place on this workshop please contact the Staff Development Unit on 0191 2226119 direct.
    Duration

    1 day
    Contact

    Jane Eggleton extension 3451

    Related Information

    Workshops