Tag: discussion

Engage Students in Discussion With the Right Questions

Asking questions happens to be one of my favorite things to do. I used to run a discussion club in Kazakhstan where students could just come and chat about some topic or another. It was my favorite thing to do, to get students up and talking. I know some teachers struggle with that. I see teachers on social media all the time asking about how to get students to speak in class, and engage in discussions. To me, asking the right questions is key.

So I thought I would share two things here: What DOES NOT work to get students thinking and talking. And then what DOES work.

Avoid the Obvious

Questions with obvious answers do not get students to talk. Sometimes our materials have alleged discussion questions. But the answers are often pretty universally agreed-upon or well-known. I once did a unit on being healthy. There were questions like “Why should we exercise? and “Is it important to be healthy?” I know there are people who pride themselves on being contrary, but it’s hard to imagine a good argument that we should want to have chronic health conditions. Or to find a new reason why people exercise. 

Furthermore, if someone did have a controversial opinion, would they be able to articulate it with the language they have? There are issues that I have nuanced positions on, outside of the mainstream. However, I probably couldn’t explain those positions in a foreign language!

So avoid questions where the answers are too clear, if you want to encourage discussion. These may vary from culture to culture and place to place but questions that tend to have obvious answers include, “Should we have rules?”, “Should we learn English?” “Is being poor uncomfortable?” or “Why is nature good?” So I don’t think asking these kinds of questions helps students think critically.

Questions that Challenge Culture

It is an ongoing debate in ESL and EFL whether we should discuss taboo or controversial topics in class. Debate centers on what constitutes a controversial topic, exactly what discussing a topic means, and what to do when students bring them up themselves. I am not going to answer those questions for you and your class. However, if you are looking to get students speaking freely and engaging in good discussion, there are ways of bringing up controversial topics that work.

From the outside point of view, certain behaviors or beliefs of our students may seem unusual. They may even seem clearly wrong (and when it comes to issues such as women’s rights, other human rights, and the treatment of certain social or ethnic groups, it may seem immoral). As an outsider, it might seem important to raise these issues. More than once, I’ve thought I could start a great discussion AND also teach them some values! I had a small class of young adults once that consisted of 6 Saudi Arabian men and two Chinese women who had worked as managers in China. When it came up in a reading, I suggested we talk about why women can’t work in some countries. 

The problem wasn’t that it started an argument, because it didn’t. The problem is the Saudis had little to say about it. You might think would generate a lot of language as they defended their position. In fact, the answer was so obvious to them, they didn’t have much to say.  How much language would I get out of you if I asked you, “Why are women treated equally to men in the US?” (at least, in theory) It’s not something we question or believe should be questioned so the question is the answer. Women are treated equally because we believe that women are equal. That’s not much language practice, is it? Interestingly, in the case of women and work in Saudi Arabia, students wanted t0 cite the Qur’an, but that was language that was above their level! Qur’anic language is not always easy!

Second, putting out a challenge to someone’s deeply held beliefs can put them on the defensive. Now, I’ve had times I’ve had to set rules that challenge a students’ culture. I’ve had students say hurtful things about homosexuality in classes with (unknown to them) homosexual students. So you may need to challenge your students, in the name of classroom community. However, if you want to start a dialogue and practice English and critical thinking, putting students on the defensive will cause them to talk less, not more!

That’s not to say that with the right group of students at the right level on the right day, you can’t have a wonderful discussion on women’s rights in Islam or political freedom in Belarus or female circumcision in Somalia. But the assumption that challenging the students’ culture will automatically lead to lots of productive discussion is a big one. It’s also unlikely you will convert them to your point of view.

Scaffolding to get Students Talking

So enough about how NOT to engage students in discussion. How do you get students talking?

My favorite strategy is to scaffold your questions. This doesn’t mean dumbing down the questions until you get an answer. That is usually the opposite of encouraging critical thinking. Instead, bring it down to their level. Here’s an example of a class discussion I had once while discussing a reading. The reading was about doctors who witness an emergency may not jump in and help people. It went more or less like this:

Me: So why do you think the doctor didn’t want to stop and help the people?
Student A: *after a long pause* the Doctor must help, because it is his job.
Me: It’s his job to help people in general, but is it his job to help THIS guy?
Student A: No.
Student B: Why not?
Student A: He is just driving by.
Student B: No, a doctor must help all people.
Student C: Teacher, in the US do you have this saying that doctors must say it, to help everyone.
Me: The Hippocratic Oath? Yes. They swear to help everyone and not harm anyone. Do they do this in your country.
Student C: Yes.
Me: How about in China, Student D?
Student D: I think so, I think yes. I don’t know.
Student E: Yes. My mother is a doctor, yes.
Me: So your mother is a doctor. Has she been in this situation?
Student E: What situation?
Student A: She sees an accident and has to help?
Student E: No. I don’t think so. Maybe. I ask her.
Me: Ok, awesome. So doctors have to promise not to hurt people. And to help people. So it’s weird that this guy doesn’t help. Isn’t it?
Students: Yes.
Me: Did we read anything about this before?
Student A: Yesterday, about bystanders. They are not involved.
Me: So is it his job to help this guy in this accident?
Students: Yes, No, maybe….
Me: Why is it hard to tell?
Student A: Because of the oath.
Student B: Because he is a bystander.
Student C: What does it mean, residency?
Me: Why do you ask?
Student C: In the story it says he is doing a residency. Is it the same as doctor?
Me: Good! No. That’s important.

I then briefly explained the medical education system in the US, and the fact that this guy wasn’t licensed yet. That, of course, helped them to clarify a huge problem and then we went on to discuss the nuances.

What I tried to do here, even when scaffolding was to ask open questions that didn’t have Yes/No answers. But I also tried to involve weaker students by asking a smattering of easier questions. Obviously, this was an advanced class so weak is a relative term here. Shy students also need easy Yes/No or short answer questions to warm up and loosen their jaws a bit. But in general scaffolding should involve open questions and bringing in more resources.

Don’t Make Them Read Your Mind

I also think an important principle here is balancing guiding students to a right answer and having no idea what they are going to say. I’ve talked about how sometimes we pretend we’re asking an open question, but we really want students to read our minds and give the answer we are thinking of. It can really stifle discussion if we are constantly steering them to our point of view.

On the other hand, if there’s no “right” answer in your mind, then the discussion will go on forever. I wanted students to notice that the person in guy wasn’t legally a doctor yet and therefore he could be sued if he practiced medicine. That point was complicated but it was implied strongly in the reading so it wasn’t terribly difficult to get to.  So I had a point I wanted them to get to, not necessarily the end point, but a point I thought they should hit. It also gave me a point of view, which is authentic. Usually when we discuss issues with friends, we have an opinion and we try to convince people of it. If I have a right answer in my head, I have an opinion and we can have a more authentic discussion than if I was just asking question after question.

However, I hadn’t expected the Hippocratic Oath to come up. And later students mentioned issues of consent (the victim was unconscious) and also religious and moral issues. By letting students guide the discussion and bring up new things, I’m also letting them have an authentic discussion. And express themselves. Critical thinking does mean breaking down walls. Asking open-ended questions means you don’t know what answer you are going to get.

So those are my thoughts on how to get students talking with questions. As always, I love feedback, comments, suggestions, critiques.

Teaching the Osage Indian Murders

This post describes one of the real historical mysteries discussed in our latest book, History’s Mysteries. This book includes 40 unsolved mysteries from history. Students read a text, discuss and analyze, do research on their own, and then complete a serious of projects designed to help them figure out what they think happened and why. In the process, they use critical thinking skills, academic research and writing skills, and get caught up in a fascinating story of intrigue! Read about the Osage Indian Murders and download a free unit teaching the Osage Indian Murders to try in your classroom!

The Osage Indian Murders or The Reign of Terror

One of the America’s most devastating unsolved historical mysteries involved oil, corruption, intrigue, over 100 murders and helped give birth to the FBI. And chances are you never heard a word about it, until now!

The Osage Indian tribe, like many Native American tribes had been forced off their native land and sent to a reservation, travelling the Trail of Tears to Kansas. However in due time, the US government again wanted to force the Osage off this land so they could develop the Midwest.

Coming to Oklahoma

In 1870 the tribe decided to buy dry and rocky land in Oklahoma. Their reasoning was that no one would want this land. No one would force them off of it. Life in Oklahoma was indeed hard. So it seemed an ironic, but well-deserved, blessing when oil was discovered on Osage land in 1894. The tribe decided to give headrights, the right to own and profit off the land, to all landowners. They paid a percentage of profits from the oil to everyone living on the reservation. This helped to enrich the whole tribe.

The richest people in the US

And there was quite a bit to go around! Checks given out to each member three times a year grew from $100 to $1000 ($13,000 in today’s money) to even higher as more oil was discovered and drilled. In 1923, alone it is estimated the tribe earned $30 million. That is the equivalent of $400 million today, making the members of the tribe the richest people on Earth! Unfortunately, that kind of money can bring a lot of problems.

Among other things, America was in the middle of The Great Depression, so people were envious of the Osage (But admired the Rockefellers and Gettys and white oil barons)! Under the guise of protecting the Osage, the US Congress passed a law that each Osage (50% or more of ‘native blood’) needed a court-appointed guardian. These guardians were usually white outsiders and they had total control over the money. The looting began immediately. Dozens of guardians were charged with corruption, but settled outside of court. Millions of stolen dollars were held by the guardian system and not returned!

The Reign of Terror

Then the killing started! In short order, 18 Osage and 3 outsiders were found dead, many connected to the first victim, Anna Brown. Brown’s mother had died so ownership of her estate was in limbo! At first, authorities called the deaths accidental, but it soon became clear that they were not. Local and state officials could not solve the murders or the web of fraud surrounding them! Possible the police were in on some of the corruption themselves.

So the tribe reached out to a new federal law enforcement branch, the FBI. At the time, this agency was called the Bureau of Investigations. It had little power or prestige. Their undercover operation investigating the Osage Indian murders helped put them on the map. They uncovered a web of contracted killings designed to eliminate members of the Osage and get their money! But many murders were never solved!

Can your students pick up where the FBI left off?

Download our free unit teaching the Osage Indian Murders below on Teacher Pay Teachers and try it out in the classroom!

Why use historical mysteries to teach English?

• Real historical mysteries are popular and engaging. There’s a reason that there are so many shows about them. Students are going to be motivated to read and discuss them, maybe be the one to solve the unsolved!
• When students study history, they are discussing events, using language to talk about cause and effect, order of events, pre-existing circumstances. And they are also expressing opinions and levels of certainty, all key language
• Analyzing a real unsolved mystery teaches key critical thinking, research, and analytical skills, important for academic work or civil life.

Logical Fallacies and Critical Thinking

The History’s Mysteries project is about more than just giving students topics to write about. It also teaches students the critical thinking tools they need to evaluate information and find good sources. That includes distinguishing between fact and opinion, recognizing bias, finding authoritative sources and citing those sources correctly. Critical thinking skills also includes avoiding logical fallacies in texts, as well as students’ own writing.

Our worksheet (fill out the form below to download it) identifies some of the most common logical fallacies. The worksheet discusses the fallacies, why they are illogical, and gives students practice identifying fallacies in the wild, while also picking out good logical arguments.

Here are some logical fallacies that I think are really important to understand in today’s world, and how they are often seen in the wild.

Whataboutism:

You counterattack your opponent calling them a hypocrite rather than defending your argument. The fact  that someone else did something wrong or that your opponent is not perfect does not actually make you right, however.

• You say that I broke the law? Well, were you angry when another person broke the law?
• You say you have a solution to climate change, but you drive a car which produces a lot of air pollution.

Sometimes, you’ll see a comment on an article discussing a completely unrelated topic. This draws the writer’s attention and that of future commentators away from the article and onto a topic of the commenter’s choosing.

• You’ve raised some interesting points about why the candidate I support is not perfect. But have you heard about this guy who appears to share the same beliefs as you? He’s a criminal and yet you say nothing about him in this article.

Ad Hominem

You attack the person instead of the argument, often with insults or accusations of bad behavior. However, people can have personal flaws and still produce logical arguments. Often, these days this argument takes the form of accusing the other person of bias or suggesting they have personal reasons to attack you. Neither method addresses the logic of an argument though.

• Of course, you would say I’m wrong. You subscribe to a newspaper that often disagrees with me, so you’re obviously brainwashed to hate me.
• Sure, students say they have too much homework. But they also don’t keep the bathrooms clean so I don’t see why we should believe them!

Begging the Question

You support your argument with logic that is only true if your argument is true. Notice that this isn’t the same thing as “raising a question”.

• According to my autobiography, I’m very intelligent, so it must be true. Why else would I write that?
• Exercise is the best way to stay healthy because the healthiest thing you can do is exercise.
• This movie is very popular, probably because a lot of people like it.

Slippery Slope

Arguing that something is wrong because it can lead to some extreme case or example.

• If we let these immigrants fleeing a natural disaster into our country, we have to let anyone in and soon we’ll be flooded with millions of new people, and we won’t have done background checks on any of them, and we won’t have the resources to feed and house and employ all 7 billion people on Earth!
• I have to punish you for this. Otherwise you’ll do more and more bad things and eventually end up in jail!

Strawman

You oversimplify or distort your opponents’ argument to make it easier to attack. Sometimes this is done by linking your opponent to another group. This is very common in political debates and it often overlaps with slippery slope fallacies. One of the easiest ways to make your opponent look bad is to pretend they want some kind of extreme measures.

• My opponent says he wants to increase funding for police departments. Sounds like he wants the police to be standing on every corner watching our every move.”
• The teachers want limits on how many hours they can be forced to work. But last year, university professors in the neighboring state agreed to give up overtime. So what exactly do these teachers and professors even want?”
• You say you want to buy a cat? But many people are allergic to cats, so basically you want me to stop having friends over after school!”

Don’t forget that logical fallacies often come from misguided, but sincere, attempts to discuss an issue rationally. Who among us hasn’t inadvertently cherrypicked data to support our opinions or delighted in a ad hominem attack about a public figure we don’t like? We don’t mean to, but it happens. When our flaws in logic are pointed out, we take them back and create better arguments.

Rhetorical Techniques That Use Logical Fallacies

However, sometimes it feels as if trolls and partisan actors are working to create flawed rhetorical techniques deliberately. These techniques often disguise the fallacies by cloaking them in emotional language or merging a few fallacies together. And they play on common sense intuitions that are all too human, but do not represent the best of human reason. Here are a few that I think deserve special attention, particularly when students read about “hot” topics such as gun control, voter rights, immigration, COVID-19 measures, and claims by political figures.

Magician’s Force

You could also call this “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” but magician’s force sounds classier and is more classroom friendly. The name comes from a method used by stage magicians to control a magic trick while giving you the illusion of choice (well-known enough that I don’t think I’m spoiling anything. Good magicians use it without you even realizing it anyway).

Imagine that there are two cards on a table. The magician wants you to choose the card on the right. So they tell you to pick any card you want. However, if you choose the card on the left, the magician says to discard it. If you choose the card on the right, the magician says to flip it over. So you control your choice, but the magician controls the reaction.

In the rhetorical world, this fallacy works by finding fault no matter what. The criticism is often crafted into talking points and spread by partisan organizations. It’s particularly blatant when employed inconsistently.

For example:

• I like this linguist’s talks on TikTok but why does she wear so much makeup? It really detracts from her credibility. That other account is great too, but it’s hard to watch her because she always wears an old T-shirt. If you want people to take you seriously, you need to dress up a bit!
• You need to spend more time on self-care. Relax and enjoy yourself. But you also need to figure out how to be more productive so that you don’t become lazy!
• We shouldn’t get involved in this conflict. The government is wrong to send our soldiers into danger all the time. And remember I’m not a dove. I have always said we need to get involved in this other conflict. Our government is too slow to use military action to stop these dangerous forces!

Rhetorical Ignorance

Another classic logical fallacy is the appeal to ignorance, the belief that if there’s little or no evidence against you, it must be true! In the age of the Internet, appeal to ignorance is becoming not just a logical fallacy, but a sign that the person is arguing in bad faith.  I’m not saying Googling is the same as researching, weighing evidence, and coming to a well-founded conclusion. But it’s hard to say “I’ve never seen an elephant swim” or “I don’t remember your newspaper writing stories about this event” when you can look up “elephants swimming” or search the newspaper archives for stories.

And yet, you’ll often find people making false assertions, often disguised as rhetorical questions, without any acknowledgement that the truth can easily be discovered. Because the person rarely acknowledges the truth, it’s a very effective way of spreading falsehoods quickly. Note that the person often uses hedges like “I don’t think” or “I doubt” or “It’s hard to believe” so they can claim that they didn’t actually accuse anybody of anything. It’s appeal to ignorance on steroids. I haven’t seen it and I’m certainly not going to look for it!

For example:

• My opponent says he cares about veterans. But has he ever sponsored any programs or laws to help them? I doubt it.
• If this issue is so important, why hasn’t the mayor ever mentioned it in a speech? I don’t remember them every saying a word about it!

This technique works well in combination with whataboutism, calling someone a hypocrite for not doing something even if they may well have done that very thing.

• Your newspaper talks about these kinds of incidents but I’ve never seen you mention this other event, not even once!

In many cases, you see statements that the person admits are totally fictional:

• The administrators have cut the school budget again. But I’ll bet they have plenty of money for their own offices! They probably have brand new computers and leather chairs and all sort of things!

Casting Doubt

This fallacy (some call it the fallacy fallacy) says that if any part of an idea is questionable, the whole idea is wrong. It ignores the fact that no idea is beyond criticism or doubt and no action will be 100% effective. It’s an easy one to use to target large concepts and widescale policies.

For example,

• If evolution is real, why aren’t there talking apes?
• God can’t be real because there are so many different religions that disagree.
• This new program to boost test scores isn’t working because some kids are still getting low scores.

The trick is that these kinds of questions are not necessarily bad questions. People of faith have questions and doubts. Lawmakers are always looking to evaluate and improve programs they create and scientists are supposed to be asking questions and clarifying points. The fallacy is in assuming the existence of any doubt means the whole concept is invalid. Furthermore, proponents of the idea in question have usually thought of these questions before and can address them, even if they can’t solve them to everyone’s satisfaction!

Nitpicking Sealions

You may have heard of sealioning, where someone, often a troll on social media, insists on asking question after question. They allege that they are simply trying to understand your position but in fact they are trying to annoy you so that you lash out. They will then claim (ad hominem style) that because you said something mean, your position is wrong. It’s also a great way to find questions to cast doubt. Eventually, they dig down to some level where you aren’t sure of the answer or you can’t account for all the nuances.

For example,

A: You say that yoga reduces your stress?

B: Yes. I always feel more relaxed after doing yoga.

A: But how exactly does stretching your body lower stress levels?

B: Well, I don’t know exactly what the connection is.

A: Your ignorance of anatomy and organic chemistry proves that yoga doesn’t make you healthier!

Teaching Logical Fallacies

These are only a few of the logical fallacies and bad-faith rhetorical techniques used out there. I’ll consider talking about some more in the future. Regardless of the method used, we can give students skills to help them spot faulty thinking and create arguments that are valid. To bring logical fallacies into the classroom, you can:

• Download the Logical Fallacies worksheet below which identifies common logical fallacies
• Have them find real world examples of arguments and analyze them for fallacies and deceptive rhetorical devices. Examples can include: advertisements, speeches by politicians, opinion essays newspapers, even social media posts.
• Controversial takes on historical events are another great source of potential logical fallacies. Check out History’s Mysteries for examples!
• Students can peer edit each other’s essays and look for fallacies, then suggest how to fix them.
• Have students write logically fallacious statements or paragraphs and then fix them.
• Check out more resources including flashcards and classroom posters at https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/.
• Enjoy these logical fallacy referee memes to employ on social media or use as flash cards: https://imgur.com/a/QDbyt/all.