Improving the quality of dialogue with and between your students

Dialogue is the foundation of learning because it allows interaction and engagement with the ideas of others. It also provides the opportunity for students to move from surface-level knowledge to deeper understanding of concepts. As a pedagogical tool, it is amongst the most effective ways to give feedback, guidance and challenge. At Challenging Learning, we have developed some superb strategies and approaches to dialogue that will help all staff in schools to make the most of the possibilities.

Key benefits of choosing dialogue as a focus for your PD:

• Learn how to increase the quality and quantity of student talk in their classroom
  
  
• Learn how dialogue engages and motivates students so that they understand key concepts more rigorously
  
  
• Understand how to make lessons more active, meaningful, challenging and collaborative
  
  
• Be able to improve their students’ reasoning skills, so they can move from surface to deep learning
  
  
• Be able to facilitate high quality dialogues that encourage students to take more ownership of their learning, share their thinking and form reasoned - and reasonable - opinions
  
  
• Know how to create the right conditions for truly exploratory dialogue to flourish, encouraging learners to become more open, more collaborative and more reflective
  
  
• Learn how to use dialogue to develop higher-order thinking skills, metacognition and the learning dispositions needed for collaboration and problem-solving
  
  
• Develop dialogue strategies for their classroom that will develop students’ language of, and for, learning