Socratic Seminar Model

The Socratic teaching method is something I have never personally tried in my classroom. I am familiar with this teaching method from previous college classes. I have read Plato’s dialogue entitled Meno, and participated in class discussions that were based on the Socratic teaching method. However I am still to nervous to try and use this method of teaching in my classroom. I teach 130 eighth grade students in a five period time span. That means my class sizes are anywhere from 24 students to 28 students in each class. Having large class sizes makes it harder to have class discussions that are students driven and involve critical thinking. It also makes it difficult to get all the students to speak and give their opinions. I could give each student two tickets and after they used their tickets they could no longer speak. This may give other, shyer students, an opportunity to participate in the class discussion. I may try, one day, to use the Socratic teaching method in my class. I just have to make sure that the students understand the purpose of the teaching model and what they should get out of it.