In an era of polarized views and heated discourse, students need structured opportunities to engage deeply with complex ideas without descending into tribalism, cognitive fallacy, and superficial opinion-sharing. This session explores Socratic Seminars as a powerful, research-aligned tool in the English classroom for developing intellectual humility, rigorous literary analysis, and the ability to navigate contentious issues productively. 

Participants will examine how text-centred Socratic dialogue moves students beyond surface-level interpretation to grapple with ambiguity, multiple perspectives, and challenging literary themes. Drawing on dialogic principles and classroom examples, the session will demonstrate practical strategies for setting up, facilitating, and assessing effective seminars - while explicitly building habits for careful listening, evidence-based reasoning, and intellectual openness.By the end of the session, attendees will leave with ready-to-use protocols, frameworks, and scaffolding techniques to help students discuss controversial or nuanced texts with greater rigour, respect, and genuine curiosity.