Engaging Difficult Dialogues

Classroom Discussion of Controversial Topics

These methods for approaching topics that are likely to generate emotional responses may result in more productive dialogue:

• Identify the purpose

• Establish ground rules/community agreements

• Provide a common base of understanding

• Create a framework for the discussion that maintains the flow 

• Include everyone

• Be an active facilitator

• Summarize and gather feedback

Handling issues involving the instructor's identity

(adapted from the Center for Research on Learning and Teaching, University of Michigan)

This 24-minute podcast features faculty from the social sciences discussing ways in which they handle conversations, many of which are addressed above.

Additional Resources

• The Teaching and Learning Lab in Harvard's Graduate School of Education compiled a significant list of resources: Teaching in Times of Strife and Trauma

• Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching: Difficult Dialogues

• Barnard College Center for Engaged Pedagogy: Dialogue and Disagreement 

• The University of Oregon created this Teaching in Turbulent Times Toolkit

• Learning for Justice offers these resources for a civil classroom.

• Facing History and Ourselves offers a number of teaching resources for  US elections. 

• Indigenous practices inform this guide to difficult dialogues in higher education.

• A community circle process may also prove useful in promoting measured conversation around raw emotions. 

Responding to Incivility in the Classroom and De-Escalating Heated Exchanges

Incivility in the classroom creates a hostile and intimidating environment that interferes with students' ability to learn and can alter the classroom environment for the remainder of the semester. Spell out academic, behavioral and language expectations on the syllabus and address it from the first day rather than awaiting for a situation to arise. Setting a respectful and inclusive tone from the outset will make responding to incivility easier if it arises. Faculty themselves should use civil language, listen actively, maintain an inclusive attitude toward all voices, teach students how to disagree with each other, model respect and understanding, speak with rather than at students, and learn their names. Importantly, faculty should maintain professional comportment at all times, both in the classroom and in more casual settings. This is especially important for younger, female and minority faculty, who, research has shown, as far more likely to experience or observe incivility in their students. 

Plan ahead and imagine how you might handle difficult classroom dynamics. And understand your own biases and strong feelings. This will enable you to be better able to manage your own reactions if a situation arises. If a situation does arise, respond rather than react. There are various strategies faculty can adopt:

• Respond immediately by naming the language or behavior as problematic or unwelcome. This assures the rest of the class that the instructor acknowledges what is happening and is not allowing it simply to pass.

• If you're not prepared to discuss the issue at that moment, acknowledge it and plan to return to it.

• Where possible, create a learning moment for everyone by connecting disruptive comments to the course content.

• Try to de-personalize insensitive or marginalizing statements. Critique the statement and not the speaker.

• Follow up in the next class session.

Adopt  a Stance on Political Discussion in the Classroom

Consider adopting the following statements:

• Political discussion belongs in our classrooms.

• Everyone is entitled to a safe learning environment, but students are not entitled to have classmates agree with them or like what they say.

• Creating a transformative college experience should feel uncomfortable. No one should be comfortable until we all live with dignity, equity, inclusion and freedom. 

Spontaneous Discussions

It's important to be prepared for controversial issues to arise. But follow these basic steps:

1. Acknowledge the student who raised the issues, noting that students may vary in their thoughts and feelings.

2. Decide whether you want to engage the topic right then or defer.

3. Quickly assess whether the class would like to spend time on the topic the student raised. If the students want to engage immediately but you would prefer to wait, explicitly schedule a discussion for a later class.  

Learning for Justice

The Southern Poverty Law Center's Learning for Justice Project offers numerous resources, including the booklet below, Responding to Hate at School: A Guide for Administrators, Counselors and Teachers. Teaching Tolerance also offers a series of on-demand webinars to support practices that help 'reduce prejudice, improve inter-group relationships, and promote equitable experiences for all students.' While geared more toward K-12 teaching, the practices and principles are relevant to all levels. The project also offers classroom strategies, supplemental materials and guidance on discussing particular topics and creating an inclusive and supportive learning environment. 

Mindfulness and Contemplation

Employing mindfulness as a framework for your classes helps students develop skills for listening with full attention to others while also noticing what reactions, emotions, associations and judgments arise in themselves as they listen. Teaching them to use breath and other emotional regulation tools helps them reduce feelings that overwhelm. Once they are more present and centered, they can then consider how best to respond in a way that increases the likeliness that they will be heard. There are many approaches, but all are fairly consistent in the intention of helping students be present, unthreatened, and aware of their thoughts and emotions without being overwhelmed by them. One approach is promoted by Tara Brach:

R - recognize what's going on

A - allow the experience to be there, just as it is

I - investigate with interest and care

N - nourish with self compassion

You can find more information about and examples of contemplative practices in education at contemplative mind.org.

Cultivate mindful listening: 

Here's a brief practice to help develop active listening skills that you can ask your students to perform. Pair your students. One will be the listener and the other the speaker. The speaker speaks (on any subject you choose) for one minute. The listener is only to listen, not to interrupt, not to think about a response, but just to carefully pay attention to what the speaker is saying. Then they switch roles. Students appreciate having a person actively listen to them for a full minute and realize how much they don't listen attentively. You can expand this practice to a more extended listening meditation practice. 

Additional Resources:

Learn mediation skills.

Racial justice: In a Time of Broken Bones: A Call for Dialogue on Hate Crimes