A teaching resource created by the HEA English Subject Centre.
Groups can sometimes fall into predictable patterns. This can involve a few lively confident students dominating whilst others remain silent and seemingly detached. Or the group as a whole can be unresponsive. Or perhaps students can take up strong positions in relation to each other for personal reasons. These patterns once established are hard to break. From early on in the ‘life’ of a seminar group it’s worth challenging students’ expectations of a ‘routine’ approach to discussion so that they arrive prepared for different styles of debate and different demands being made on them. Using a variety of approaches also plays to different students’ strengths giving space for quieter students to find room for expression rather than having to fight for it.
