Workshop

Date: January 25, 2018

Presenters: Joyce Yamada and John McKee

Topic: Welcome, Concentric Circle, and Discussion with VCAA

Documents

Scenarios Teaching for Learning Spring 2018 and Concentric Circle Presentation

Concentric Circle Activity

It is best to structure the topics so that they build on each other and move forward chronologically.

The following set of topics would be appropriate for a training session for student teachers:

  • Talk about the neighborhood you grew up in and some of your earliest memories.
  • Talk about your favorite and least favorite teacher from elementary school.
  • Talk about that time that you broke a rule, and what happened.
  • Talk about what you want and need out of your education.
  • Talk about what you like about teaching, and what are its greatest challenges for you.
  • Talk about a lesson plan that worked and one that didn’t.
  • Talk about your approach on discipline – what works and what doesn’t.
  • Talk about something that scares you and how you deal with it.
  • Talk about something that makes you angry and how you deal with it.
  • Talk about how you think racial dynamics affect education.
  • Talk about what your hope is for the future of education, and how we can reach that goal.
  • Talk about where you hope to be five years from now.

Instuctions

  1. Have the group arrange their chairs so that they are facing each other in two circles, one inside the other. You can have the group count off by 2s (1, 2, 1, 2…). Then have all the 1s form their chairs into an inner circle, facing the 2s who were to their left. Or you can simply say that every other person should move their chair to face the person to their left. If the group includes people from different subgroups (for example, teachers and students), tell one subgroup to form the inner circle, so they will be talking with people from the other subgroup rather than to each other.
  2. Once the circles have been created, tell the group that they will be having a series of short conversations with a series of partners. They should introduce themselves to each new partner, and they should share the time so that each person has a chance to speak
  3. Give the group a question that each pair is to discuss.
  4. After one or two minutes, call time. Allow less time for younger people and more time for older. (Keep the time short enough so that people still have more to say when they need to move on.) Tell the inside circle to move one seat to the left so that everyone is facing someone new.
  5. Remind people to be sure and introduce themselves to their new partners. Then give another question for the new pairs to discuss.
  6. In smaller groups, this continues until the inside circle has moved completely around to where they began. In larger groups, have people move 10 to 20 times, depending on how long you can dedicate to the exercise. Adjust the time you give each pair and the number of times you have people move according to the needs of the group and the constraints of the meeting.