The Discussion Book

Chapter 2

Chalk Talk

Developed by Hilton Smith (2009) of the Foxfire Fund, this is a great way to get a quick visual and graphic representation of where a group is on an issue. It's very brief—no more than five minutes long—and done in silence. Chalk Talk is a good way to unearth the concerns of a wide range of organizational members before building agendas for change or to discover how well students understand an issue or topic.

Purposes

• To produce a graphic representation of where a group, team, or class stands on an issue or topic in a way that indicates points of shared agreement, clusters of different or opposing viewpoints, and outlier perspectives to be considered
• To secure at least 60 percent participation (it's often much higher), ...