Description
Group Interaction is a more formal version of Conversation. In Conversation, the person with the new learning does most of the talking, presenting to one or more other people, who can ask questions. In Group Interaction, the questions and interactions are nearly scripted, to make sure that certain questions and certain thought pathways are included.
Method
Whether the group is just a dyad (two people) or a small group of four or five, it’s a good idea to include these features:
- Clarification. The presenter needs to be able to communicate his or her knowledge in a clear and understandable way, and support the knowledge claims with appropriate evidence, arguments, and reasons. In the course of the presentation, then, at various intervals, the listener(s) should
- paraphrase the presenter’s important points
- explain the structure of the presenter’s argument: thesis (central idea) and reasons
- generate a list of confirming and disconfirming arguments applicable to the presenter’s thesis
- list or draw the sequence of steps in the process, the points made, or reasons supporting the argument
- outline the presentation and discuss the outline with the presenter to see how well the outline captures the presenter’s intention.
- Exploring in the box. The listeners to the presentation should ask the following questions in an interview-style interaction when the presenter is finished:
- Why is this important? That is, now that you and we know this, so what?
- Please explain this aspect more fully or clarify this idea.
- What would be another example?
- Exploring out of the box. These questions take the presenter and the audience beyond the immediate information just learned into the context around it. It’s important to be able to fit new knowledge into current knowledge. This is a process known as integration.
- Can you give us a non-example?
- What would be an example of disconfirming evidence? (Evidence that would argue against the presenter’s information or central idea.)
- Who disagrees with your conclusions, and what do they say?
- What are the weak points in your conclusions?
- How does this new knowledge fit in with your current knowledge?
- Personal response. Learning that impacts us personally is much more likely to be remembered than something we just memorized off hand and only for a test. Here are some personalization questions.
- What surprised you the most about learning this?
- What one thing (or two or three things) that you learned impacted you the most on a personal level?
- What are you still curious about?
- Will you be doing additional research in this area? Why? Why not? What?
When the information is complex or has more than one position, two presenters can deliver aspects of the same idea or arguments for opposing positions. In the latter case, the format is a debate. The audience (the other members of the small group or class) can then question each presenter in turn using some of the structured questions above.