Creating Guidance for Equitable Discussion
One way to help encourage equitable participation is to assign, or have students sign up for, roles for students to take during discussion. This helps to evenly distribute responsibility during discussion and offers students multiple ways to participate depending on their level of comfort.
Some roles could be:
Someone who begins the discussion and decides if it’s time to move on to a new prompt.
Someone who monitors either time left in the activity, or the amount of time people spend talking as to ensure nobody dominates the conversation.
Someone who reports out to the whole class a summary of the discussion.
Someone who takes notes during discussion and helps the reporter summarize the discussion at the end of class.
The University of Michigan also offers three tips for including all participants:
Activity
Read this article on Inclusive and Equitable discussions for ideas
in ensuring equitable participation.
