Socratic Seminar Guidelines and Rubric

Socratic Seminar Guidelines and Rubric
Students: Here are the general guidelines for participating in a Socratic seminar, and a scoring
rubric I will use to grade your participation.
Guidelines for participating

Come prepared. Bring notes and bookmarked pages that are relevant to the discussion.
Participate, participate, participate!
Relate your comments to the text or its themes.
Back up comments with evidence you have gathered.
Try to comment on someone else's previous statement before you give yours.
Personal stories should have a direct connection to the text.
Keep discussion alive by asking open-ended, thought-provoking questions.
Disagree with comments, not individuals. Never put anyone down.
Use your speaking time fairly (contribute but don’t control).
Participant Rubric
4 3 2 1
-Offers enough solid -Offers solid analysis -Offers some analysis, -Offers little
analysis, without without prompting. but needs prompting commentary.
prompting, to move -Demonstrates a good from the seminar -Comes to the seminar
the conversation knowledge of the text leader. ill-prepared with little
forward. and the question. -Demonstrates a understanding of the
-Demonstrates a deep -Comes to the seminar general knowledge of text and question.
knowledge of the text prepared, with notes the text and question. -Does not listen to
and the question. and a marked or -Is less prepared, with others, offers no
-Comes to the seminar annotated text. few notes and no commentary to further
prepared, with notes -Shows active marked or annotated the discussion.
and a marked or listening, offers text.
annotated text . clarification and/or -Actively listens, but
-Shows active follow-up. does not offer
listening. -Relies on the text to clarification and/or
-Offers clarification drive his or her follow-up to others’
and/or follow-up that comments. comments.
extend the - Relies more upon his
conversation. or her opinion, and
-Makes comments less on the text to
that refer to specific drive his or her
parts of the text. comments.
The Socratic Questioning Technique
The Socratic approach to questioning is based on the practice of disciplined, thoughtful

dialogue. Socrates, the early Greek philosopher/teacher, believed that disciplined practice
of thoughtful questioning enabled the student to examine ideas logically and to determine
the validity of those ideas. In this technique, the teacher professes ignorance of the topic
in order to engage in dialogue with the students. With this “acting dumb,” the student
develops the fullest possible knowledge about the topic.
The Socratic questioning technique is an effective way to explore ideas in depth. It can be
used at all levels and is a helpful tool for all teachers. It can be used at different points
within a unit or project. By using Socratic questioning, teachers promote independent
thinking in their students and give them ownership of what they are learning. Higher-
level thinking skills are present while students think, discuss, debate, evaluate, and
analyze content through their own thinking and the thinking of those around them. These
types of questions may take some practice on both the teacher and students’ part since it
may be a whole new facet of learning.
Tips for Using Socratic Questioning:

 Plan significant questions that provide meaning and direction to the dialogue
 Use Wait Time: Allow at least thirty seconds for students to respond
 Follow up on students’ responses
 Ask probing questions
 Periodically summarize in writing key points that have been discussed
 Draw as many students as possible into the discussion
 Let students discover knowledge on their own through the probing questions the
teacher poses
Types of Socratic Questions and Examples

The Socratic Questioning technique involves different type of questions. Some examples of these are:
Socratic Question Type Example

Clarification questions  What do you mean by…?
 Could you put that another way?
 What do you think is the main issue?
 Could you give us an example?
 Could you expand upon that point further?
Questions about an initial  Why is this question important?

question or issue  Is this question easy or difficult to answer?
 Why do you think that?
 What assumptions can we make based on this
question?
 Does this question lead to other important issues and
questions?
Assumption questions  Why would someone make this assumption?
 What is _______ assuming here?
 What could we assume instead?
 You seem to be assuming______.
 Do I understand you correctly?
Reason and evidence  What would be an example?

questions  Why do you think this is true?
 What other information do we need?
 Could you explain your reason to us?
 By what reasoning did you come to that conclusion?
 Is there reason to doubt that evidence?
 What led you to that belief?
Origin or source  Is this your idea or did you hear if from some place
questions else?
 Have you always felt this way?
 Has your opinion been influenced by something or
someone?
 Where did you get that idea?
 What casued you to feel that way?
Implication and  What effect would that have?

consequence questions  Could that really happen or probably happen?
 What is an alternative?
 What are you implying by that?
 If that happened, what else would happen as a result?
Why?
Viewpoint questions  How would other groups of people respond this

question? Why?
 How could you answer the objection that
______would make?
 What might someone who believed _____ think?
 What is an alternative?
 How are ____ and ____’s ideas alike? Different?
Socratic Questioning Example
This questioning dialogue would take place after the unit had been introduced and was well underway.
Teacher: What is happening to our global climate?

Stan: It’s getting warmer.
Teacher: How do you know it’s getting warmer? What evidence do you have to support your answer?
Stan: It’s in the news all of the time. They are always saying that it’s not as cold as it used to be. We have all of
these record heat days.
Teacher: Has anyone else heard of this kind of news?
Denise: Yeah. I have read about it the newspaper. They call it global warming, I think.
Teacher: Are you saying that you learned about global warming from newscasters? Are you assuming they know
that global warming is occurring?
Heidi: I heard it too. It’s terrible. The ice caps in the Arctic are melting. The animals are losing their homes. I
think the newscasters hear it from the scientists that are studying the issue.
Teacher: If that is the case and the scientists are telling the newscasters, how do the scientists know?
Chris: They have instruments to measure climate. They conduct research that measures the Earth’s temperature.
Teacher: How long do you think scientists have been doing this?
Grant: Probably 100 years.
Candace: Maybe a little more than that.
Teacher: Actually, it’s been studied for about 140 years. Since about 1860.
Heidi: We were close.
Teacher: Yes. How did you know that?
Grant: I just figured that seems like when instruments were available and scientists had the means to measure
climate like that.
Teacher: So, looking at the last 100 year’s climate on this graph, what can we say about the earth’s climate?
Raja: The 20th century has become much warmer than previous centuries.
Teacher: Can we hypothesize why?
Raja: One word: pollution.
Teacher: What are you assuming when you say that pollution is the cause for the temperatures to rise?
Heidi: Carbon dioxide from cars causes pollution and chemicals from factories.
Frank: Hair spray causes dangerous chemicals to get into the atmosphere.
Teacher: Okay. Let’s take a minute to review what we’ve discussed so far.
View the unit plan Literature e-Circles to see a Socratic Seminar in practice.

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Socratic Seminar Guidelines and Rubric

Guidelines for participating

The Socratic Questioning Technique

The Socratic approach to questioning is based on the practice of disciplined, thoughtful

Tips for Using Socratic Questioning:

Types of Socratic Questions and Examples

Socratic Question Type Example

Questions about an initial  Why is this question important?

Reason and evidence  What would be an example?

Implication and  What effect would that have?

Viewpoint questions  How would other groups of people respond this

Teacher: What is happening to our global climate?

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