The Discussion Book

Introduction

You all know the scene. Another day, another meeting, and a feeling of complete pointlessness descending on you as you make your way to the conference room. Or you trudge to a mandatory leadership, staff, or professional development workshop expecting to be alternately bored and chastised while an “expert” tells you how you can be a better teacher, leader, decision maker, team member; how you can think out of the box, incorporate technology, address diversity, and generally be a pedagogic superhero. Alternatively you plod to class knowing that your efforts to get students to discuss the assigned reading will be met by awkward silence, averted eyes, and a reluctance to talk that swirls in the classroom atmosphere like a thick, Victorian ...